James Arbuthnot: Reverting to the question put by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, South (Mr. Binley) earlier, one concern about the Iraqi Ministry of Defence's procurement processes is that some factions within Iraq might be trying to keep the Iraqi army unnecessarily weak. What can we, the British, do about that? General Mohan is short of machine guns and mortars, and he needs a speedy answer to that problem.

Bob Russell: What discussions he has had with the Essex local education authority on provision of school places for the children of personnel to be stationed in super garrisons with reference to recommendation 5 of the Defence Committee report on educating service children (HC(2005-06) 1054); and if he will make a statement.

Derek Twigg: I pay tribute to the service of my hon. Friend's father, of whom I know she is very proud. Our Children's Education Advisory Service considers regularly the range of education issues and has discussions with local education authorities. Of course, our own education service also provides schools, for example in Germany. Our results are in the top 25 of 150 local education authorities, which is laudable.
	My hon. Friend will know that from 10 December 2007 all members of the UK armed forces have had access to the new armed forces child care voucher. They can choose to receive between £30 and £243 per month in child care vouchers of cash with salary from the MOD. That is a major step forward. It has been welcomed by the service families federations, and I am sure that it will be well taken up.

Greg Hands: The new Lisbon treaty contains various unhelpful developments on defence and security policy; for example, the new high representative for the common foreign and security policy will become a vice-chairman of the Commission and will chair the foreign policy aspect of the Council of Ministers, the EU Commissioner for Enterprise and Industry is calling for a single market in the defence industry and the new solidarity clause has emerged. Will the Secretary of State tell us specifically what assessment he has made of new treaty provisions that are judiciable by the European Court of Justice?

Bob Ainsworth: The Government are publishing in the spring the first ever cross-Government strategy setting out our vision for supporting service personnel, their families and veterans. Since we announced it, I have been encouraged by the response. The Department for Health has introduced an extension of priority medical treatment to all veterans with a service-attributable condition and, with the MOD, a mental health community pilot scheme. The Department for Communities and Local Government has extended the open market home-buy scheme to members of the armed forces to help make home ownership more achievable in all regions of England, and we intend to remove local connection legislation to ensure fairness for our armed forces in housing allocations.

Derek Twigg: My hon. Friend is honorary colonel of the Durham Army Cadet Force, which is a privileged position. I thank her for her long-standing support; I know that she takes a significant interest in the cadets. I believe that it is the best youth movement in the country by a mile. I am always delighted to talk to cadets; on a tri-service basis, of course. As she may recall, we announced last year that new combined cadet forces will be set up at six schools. I believe that cadet forces will continue to thrive. They give young people a fantastic experience and many opportunities to do things that they would not normally do. As I say, I think that it is the best youth service in the country.

Mark Pritchard: With With a decision on the future rapid effect system utility variant vehicle expected before April 2008, will the Secretary of State confirm what his views are on the sharing of intellectual property once that decision has been made? Would it be better for Britain to have the French VBCI vehicle, or the General Dynamics vehicle? We know about the track record of General Dynamics on sharing intellectual property.

Des Browne: I refute the assertion that our servicemen are not treated well either in or after service. I do not demur from my responsibility to meet the challenge of increased expectations in the 21st century, particularly those resulting from the deployments in which we have asked our servicemen and women to take part. We have made significant improvements, day by day, week by week, year by year, in that regard.
	As for specific numbers, there is a constant assertion, often fed by politicians, that information about troop numbers in Iraq is erroneous. It is not. Troop numbers were reduced to about 4,500 before the turn of the year. Indeed, only last week there were 4,330 troops in Iraq, but that number fluctuates because of rest and recuperation, and sometimes because of temporary troop deployments. It is of no help to families who have to live with those concerns to suggest that information is inaccurate, as that is not the case. They are general figures, but the trend is for a reduction. We will meet the reduction that we announced in the House and when appropriate, we will make another statement about a reduction in numbers.

Des Browne: I am happy to deal with the issue that the hon. Gentleman raised in relation to the facts, not in relation to speculation or rumour. I will be in touch with him and I will put a copy of the letter in the House setting out our understanding of the position on the joint strike fighter in relation to the American programme.

Des Browne: As we always say in relation to these issues, when there is an announcement to be made we will make it to the House of Commons. When there is a further announcement to be made in relation to Eurofighter, we will make it here. I do not think that it serves anyone to feed speculation by putting numbers into the public domain for consideration prior to our making a decision. When a decision is made, we will say it here.

George Osborne: Can the Chancellor confirm that he wants the taxpayers of Britain to provide a £25 billion mortgage to Northern Rock for years to come? Add in the guarantees to depositors and that figure comes to £55 billion. That is £2,000 for every family in the country: a second mortgage on every home to rescue the reputation of this Government. No British Government have ever provided taxpayers' support on this scale to a private company. It is bigger than British Leyland, bigger than British Steel—this is back to the 1970s. Life in Brown's Britain is like an episode of "Life On Mars".
	Can the Chancellor answer questions on these three specific issues? First, will he stop pretending that this is, as he said in the final paragraph of his statement, a commercial solution? In truth, it is a part-nationalisation because the Government take the bulk of the risk and the private sector takes the bulk of the upside. Alliance and Leicester has gone into the market and borrowed at 7 per cent., but thanks to the taxpayer, Northern Rock's new owners will be borrowing at Government rates. If it goes under, of course, it will be the British taxpayer who pays the price. It is no wonder that Northern Rock's shares have soared 40 per cent. on a day on which the stock market has fallen.
	The second issue I want to press the Chancellor on is the growing risk to the taxpayer that this deal represents. Will he confirm that the difference in the cost of capital means that Northern Rock will be getting an effective Government subsidy for years to come? Some estimate that the subsidy is worth more than £1 billion in total. That is more than 20 times the cost of funding this year's police pay settlement in full. What is his estimate? How much will the fee that he mentioned recoup of that £1 billion subsidy? Will he confirm that buried away in his statement is the proposal that the bonds issued by the Government can be used not just to repay the Bank of England loan, but to provide adequate liquidity for the company? How much could that cost?
	What does this whole deal mean for public finances? We already have the worst budget deficit in Europe, and we have learned from today's dismal public finance figures that the Treasury has borrowed £44 billion so far this year, exceeding the estimates given by the Chancellor to this House. Will he confirm, as he admits, that if the ONS treats the Government as the true economic owner of the liabilities, he will shatter the sustainable investment rule? He says that the measure is only temporary, but the whole point of the deal is that it could be permanent. As ever, the Government's answer to every economic problem is further debt.
	The third and final issue for the Chancellor to consider is how long the Northern Rock saga will go on for. The right hon. Gentleman's statement made no mention of the length of term of the bonds, yet the press have been briefed by the Prime Minister's travelling entourage that they will last for five years. Which is it? Will the Chancellor tell Parliament what someone else is telling the press on the other side of the world? What will the time scale be?
	In September, the Chancellor said that he was providing a little short-term support to help Northern Rock get through its difficulties. Since then, we have had five months of dithering. Today, the taxpayer could possibly be in hock for five years. The Government could have secured a private sale before the bank run. They could have done today's deal back in September, if they were so keen on it, at a much cheaper price. They could have passed legislation to protect retail depositors, as we proposed, back in October. They could have considered the options of a Bank of England-led reconstruction. Labour Members dismissed that, but when the Chancellor unveils his plans next week he will suggest that in future crises the FSA has the powers to take organisations such as Northern Rock into an effective form of administration. Labour Members will all be voting for that in a couple of weeks time.
	Of course, the Chancellor did none of those things. He dithered and delayed. The result is that the British taxpayer is being asked to lend billions of pounds for years to come to salvage the reputation of the Prime Minister and his Chancellor. Labour is saddling everyone in Britain with a second mortgage, and that is the price that we are all now paying for its economic incompetence.

Vincent Cable: I congratulate the Chancellor on brilliant originality. The Government, through their bond guarantees, are solemnly undertaking to repay the Government. The taxpayer is standing behind the taxpayer and we have a private sector solution without private money as well as nationalisation of liabilities and losses and privatisation of profits. It requires a special sort of genius to dream up such an idea and I hope that the Government's financial advisers have been well rewarded.
	I am tempted to recall the Danish economist, Hans Christian Andersen, who told the story of the two conmen who visited a particularly credulous king to sell him an imaginary suit of gold to cover his nakedness. We have a naked King Gordon, desperately trying to cover his embarrassment over the "n" word "nationalisation".
	It was said this morning in the City that the financial value in the insurance markets of the guarantee of the bonds was £2 billion. Since the private buyers are not providing that money, where will it come from? Are we talking about a guarantee of a guarantee? How else will it be funded?
	The Chancellor said that there would be a profit-sharing arrangement between taxpayers and the private owner, but no numbers were given. Is it true, as the  Financial Times reported this morning, that the proposal is likely to be for a 5 to 10 per cent. Government equity stake, with 95 to 90 per cent. of the uplift going to the private owner? If the proposal is of that order of magnitude, what is the position, if there is to be profit sharing, of the Northern Rock Foundation? The Chancellor mentioned it in the context not of profit sharing but of nationalisation.
	Since we have heard from the north-east of England, the Chancellor will know that the Treasury's private sale document made not a single, solitary reference to jobs or the future of the region, so what is its role under the proposals?
	This morning, the BBC's political correspondent described Mr. Branson as the "cat what got the cream". I do not know what that is, but Mr. Branson appears to be the Government's preferred bidder. Can the Chancellor tell us what Mr. Branson is going to contribute? My understanding is that he is proposing to put in £250 million in kind, not cash, to acquire a bank worth £100 billion, or 40 times that value. He has never run a bank, and I believe that the profits will be routed through a Caribbean tax haven, so what benefit does the taxpayer derive from his participation?
	Finally, as the Conservative spokesman has already noted, Northern Rock shares have soared, while the British and other international stock markets have fallen. The only cheerful faces this morning were those of the two equity fund investors who made a speculative punt on Northern Rock a few months ago and have now recouped their investment. Meanwhile, the taxpayer is being taken for a very big ride. That will continue until the Government adopt the honest, transparent solution of taking the bank into public ownership.

Alistair Darling: As I said earlier, the hon. Gentleman has argued for the nationalisation of Northern Rock for some time, but he would accept that if the Government do that, many of the issues that he has raised still come into play. He has said on a number of occasions that he does not think that the long-term future of the bank lies as being publicly owned. He sees nationalisation as a temporary step back into the public sector, and I agree that if it came to that, that would be precisely the position that we should adopt, because the long-term future of the bank cannot lie with being run by the Government.
	The hon. Gentleman must accept, therefore, that if the bank is nationalised, the risks to which he referred will remain with the Government, and that money from the private sector investors does not come immediately into the bank, so the Government will have to fund that. In any event, if the bank is subsequently transferred into the private sector, which he and I agree would be the right thing to do, under current market conditions it is likely that similar Government guarantees to those that I am proposing today would have to apply then, too.
	The difference between the hon. Gentleman and me is that he wants to nationalise today. I believe that the better option, if we can do this on the right terms and conditions—the hon. Gentleman raises some very fair points about this—is to explore whether we can bring those private investors into Northern Rock now, which would enable the Bank of England's lending to be repaid with interest, which is one of the demands that has been made time and time again in the House, and rightly so.
	The hon. Gentleman raised a number of points about profit sharing and the financing details, which can be resolved only during the course of negotiation. As I said to the shadow Chancellor, I will of course keep the House informed about that. In relation to the prospective bidders, two have publicly expressed an interest and the Government are talking to both of them, while the company's existing board is also considering proposals. All those will be considered, along with any others that are made in the next few days.

Kenneth Clarke: Does the Chancellor agree that, a few months ago, it was obvious that, in order to protect financial stability, it would be necessary to give guarantees to depositors and to achieve a quick, orderly work-out of the situation at minimum risk to taxpayers, in circumstances in which it has long been obvious that no purely private sector or commercial solution was going to be remotely possible? Is it not the case that, after five months of delay, we are now being offered a proposal that will be of benefit to the shareholders in Northern Rock, including hedge funds, who will find that their shares have been given a value by this statement that they would not otherwise have had, and to future investors in Northern Rock, whoever they might be, who will find that the Government and the taxpayer are taking on an open-ended commitment to take all the principal risk involved? This is surely the result of dithering and delay, and of political considerations getting in the way of the speedy decision making and the orderly work-out that could have been achieved even before Christmas.

Michael Fallon: Is the Chancellor aware that the Swedish taxpayer still owns 20 per cent. of Sweden's largest bank 16 years after the Government stepped in there? When he told the exchange this morning that he expects Northern Rock to operate without Government support "in due course", how would he define "in due course"?

Alistair Darling: Not exactly, no. The difficulties in the US sub-prime market, which started the present problems, were primarily caused by the fact that, it would appear, too many lenders did not know whom they had lent to and had no idea of the true value of the assets on which those loans were secured. Securitisation in itself is not a bad thing, as I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would agree. What matters is whether lenders know what they are doing. If only some of those who had lent to householders in America over the past few years had realised that those borrowers did not have enough income to support the loan repayments, and their houses were not worth anything like what was claimed, we might not be in the difficulties that we are in today.

Alistair Darling: Yes, we will. I said earlier to the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed that I recognise the importance of the foundation. My point was that in the event that we had to take the bank into a period of public ownership, we would have to provide for that. If the proposals as set out today come to fruition, I know that the company and the bidders are acutely aware of the importance of the foundation and will want to do what they can to help. This is one of the many problems that need to be sorted out and addressed, but I assure my hon. Friend and other Members who represent north-east constituencies that we are well aware of the problem and will do whatever we can to help. These are, however, difficult decisions and difficult times.

Peter Lilley: The Chancellor repeatedly reassured the House that Northern Rock has a good quality loan book. I have no doubt that most of its old loans are well secured, but is it entirely credible that a company that increased its loan book by 50 per cent. at the top of the market in the year before banks stopped lending to it, did so without hoovering up some sub-prime mortgages as well as prime mortgages? Given that bad mortgages cannot be secured against good mortgages, will the Chancellor accept that he is accepting, on behalf of the taxpayer, the risk of all the bad mortgages in that loan book?

Alistair Darling: I was reporting what the FSA said in relation to the Northern Rock mortgage book. It has said it on a number of occasions, and I believe it to be an accurate representation of the position.

Des Browne: Mr. Speaker, with your permission, I should like to inform the House about the theft of laptop computers from Ministry of Defence vehicles and premises. The MOD has clear policies, systems and procedures in place to protect the security of information, both personal data and classified information. We have software protection through encryption and a formal information security process through which individual IT systems and the databases they contain must be accredited by the appropriate MOD authorities. Our internal investigations following this theft reveal that those procedures were not followed. That was a breach of MOD security regulations.
	As police investigations of the theft are at an active stage, I am limited in what I can say about the incident. It occurred on the night of Wednesday 9 January in Edgbaston, Birmingham. The laptop was left in a car that had been parked overnight and was unattended. That was a breach of security regulations. The stolen laptop contains personal information on about 600,000 people, the majority of whom had simply expressed an interest in joining the Royal Navy, the Royal Marines or the Royal Air Force.
	We have no reason to believe that the theft was specifically targeted against the officer, or to acquire the laptop for the data held on it, but we cannot wholly discount that. Early the morning after the laptop was left in the unattended car, as soon as the theft was discovered, it was reported to the local police and the relevant authorities in the MOD.
	It is not clear to me why recruiting officers routinely carry with them information on such a large number of people—or, indeed, why the database retains such information at all. The information held is not the same for every individual. In some cases the record may be no more than a name, but I am advised that for about 153,000 people who progressed as far as submitting an application form to join the forces, more extensive personal data are held, including passport details, national insurance numbers, driver's licence details, family details, doctors' addresses and national health service numbers; for about 3,700 people, banking details were also included. The records largely date back to 2003, although some records may date back as far as 1997.
	Ministers were informed of the loss of the laptop on Friday 11 January, although at that point it was believed that the data were fully encrypted. That is relevant because the level of encryption used by the Ministry of Defence on its computers is stronger than that used for commercial applications, and our IT authorities judge that a significant amount of time, resources and, in particular, expertise would be needed to access such data in a readable format.
	The fact that the data were not encrypted was reported to Ministers on Monday 14 January. Subsequently, the Information Commissioner and the police authorities were informed, and as an immediate precaution all similar laptops were recalled from their users and secured. That was completed by 18 January. The theft is being investigated by the West Midlands police, assisted by the Ministry of Defence police. After consultation with the police about the impact on the investigation were the theft to become public knowledge, I decided not to make a statement to Parliament last Thursday—although I was ready to do so. Unfortunately, news of the theft of the laptop was reported in the media on Friday evening and the MOD was obliged to issue a brief statement setting out the facts of the incident, as they were being reported inaccurately.
	I discussed the need to issue a brief statement on Friday with Mr. Speaker and the hon. Members for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) and for North Devon (Nick Harvey). I also attempted to speak to the right hon. Member for North-East Hampshire (Mr. Arbuthnot) and my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Dr. Wright), without success, although I have spoken to them both today. However, steps were taken to keep the Information Commissioner fully informed and to alert the Association for Payment Clearing Services so that banks could monitor the bank accounts listed in the database to prevent unauthorised access.
	The intelligence services were also informed, and asked to assess whether the incident could lead to an increased threat to our personnel. Their view, understandably, was that the risk would depend on whether the information fell into the hands of extremists, but that there was no indication that had happened. Of course, we are keeping the matter under constant review.
	Letters have been sent to all 3,700 people whose bank details were included in the database, and are being sent to the 153,000 people who applied to join the Royal Navy, the Royal Marines or the Royal Air Force during the relevant periods. We have set up a free telephone helpline, an e-mail address and an address for correspondence for use by anyone who is concerned about the implications of the data loss and wishes to seek further information.
	As soon as the theft was reported, the Royal Navy began an internal investigation into the incident itself, which has now been completed. Steps are being taken by the Navy to prevent a recurrence, and the chain of command is considering appropriate action against the officer concerned.
	An internal investigation is also under way by the MOD's head of security into the wider security issues raised by the loss of the data. In the time available, the investigation has established that in addition to the laptop stolen on 9 January, two further laptops potentially containing similar data have been stolen. A Royal Navy laptop similar to that stolen on 9 January was stolen from a car in Manchester in October 2006, and an Army recruiting laptop, containing details of about 500 individuals, was stolen from a careers office in Edinburgh in December 2005.
	These incidents were reported at the time to the local police and to the chain of command, although neither theft was reported to Ministers. Those involved believed that the data were protected by encryption and so no steps were taken to inform those whose records were potentially at risk. That is now being done in the same manner as I have described for those affected by the most recent loss. Nor was the Information Commissioner informed, but that has now been done. There is nothing to suggest that the earlier thefts have been exploited for criminal purposes or any other purpose in the intervening period.
	As I said, our internal investigation has identified weaknesses in the application of MOD security procedures to the database, which is managed by the Army recruiting and training division on behalf of all three services.
	In the time available, it has not been possible to establish all the facts, but it is clear that the database files were unencrypted, in breach of MoD procedures, and that there were shortcomings in security training and awareness among the relevant staff. Further, although the MOD was a full participant in the Cabinet Office-led review following the loss of data by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the thefts and the failure to comply with agreed MOD procedures for the system were not highlighted by those responsible for the system during the first phase of that review.
	Accordingly, following consultation with the Information Commissioner, I have invited Sir Edmund Burton to undertake a full investigation into how these weaknesses came about, including responsibility for any breach of security and accreditation procedures, and to review the steps that we have taken to prevent any recurrence. Sir Edmund is chairman of the Information Assurance Advisory Council and supports the Cabinet Office in the implementation of the Government's information assurance strategy. He is also a former chairman of the Police Information Technology Organisation and former commandant of the Royal Military College of Science.
	Sir Edmund will work closely with those in the Cabinet Office who have been reviewing procedures across Government, following the HMRC loss of data. His report will enable us to answer the questions that still need to be answered. The Information Commissioner has confirmed in particular that the review will be wide enough to address the questions that he has raised, including why a database of this size was thought necessary for field recruitment staff. It will also enable the chain of command to identify where responsibility lies and whether anyone needs to face action as a result. Sir Edmund's full report will be made available to the Information Commissioner.
	I take this theft of personal data extremely seriously. I am also keenly aware of the risks if the data had fallen into the wrong hands, although I emphasise that there is no evidence that they have done so. As with all parts of Government, those who have dealings with the armed forces have a right to expect that their data will be properly protected. I very much regret that that has not happened. I am determined that we should identify exactly what went wrong and learn lessons. This must never happen again, and I will keep the House informed of the outcome of the various investigations to which I have referred.

Des Browne: My hon. Friend is right to identify the fact that Sir Edmund Burton is well qualified to do this job. Those who know him, and his fierce reputation as an independent advocate in this area, know that he is well qualified to undertake the investigation. I have set out in short the remit for Sir Edmund's wide-ranging investigation, and I am satisfied that, as agreed with the Information Commissioner, it addresses all the necessary questions and gives Sir Edmund the flexibility that he needs. If it transpires that there has been a breach of the law—and whatever law is breached—those who are responsible will have to live with consequences, because they are accountable.

Des Browne: The hon. Gentleman referred to the conversation that I had with him on Friday night. In case it is not clear, I should say that I had intended, and was ready, to make this statement on Thursday. After discussions with the police, and for reasons to do with the stage of the police investigation, I made the judgment that it would be better to wait. Unfortunately, however, the media broke the story on Friday. I deeply regret that I had to put a statement into the public domain without speaking in the House about it first, but the story running in the media was wrong, and I could not leave it wrong over the weekend. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, the hon. Member for Woodspring and Mr. Speaker for their understanding when I contacted them on Friday night to explain what I was doing. I trust that the House will accept that my judgment was right.
	The fundamental point made by the hon. Member for North Devon (Nick Harvey) is right—but I did not say that the MOD had "robust" policies, systems and procedures; I said that we had "clear" policies, systems and procedures. The hon. Gentleman pointed to a draft of the statement— [Interruption.] I make this point advisedly. The hon. Gentleman has pointed to a draft of my statement—to be checked against delivery—that we gave him. When I was given the final draft of the statement, immediately after Defence questions, I changed that word.
	The hon. Gentleman is right: the robustness of the policies and procedures depends on their being observed. The failure to observe those procedures will be the focus of the investigation that I have set up; that failure caused the need for my statement today, and the potential release of the information into the hands of people who should not have it. I deeply regret that, and I am determined to find out why it happened. I cannot give the House an explanation why information relating to 600,000 people needed to be on a laptop; frankly, and without wishing to prejudge the investigation, I do not believe that it needed to be.
	I listened to the Information Commissioner with care when he was on the radio this morning. I listened to the questions that he posed; all those questions need to be answered. I have deliberately framed the remit of the investigation so that they will be answered. I have the comfort of knowing that my senior officials spoke to him about the issue, and I understand that he is of the same view. The hon. Gentleman can be satisfied that I am taking the matter appropriately seriously. If there are consequences for individuals, those individuals will have to live with them, whatever they may be. I am not in a position to deliver such a judgment; that is for the chain of command.

Peter Lilley: Given the series of incredible and repeated scandals involving child benefit discs, Department of Work and Pensions data in binbags, and military laptops, has not the time come for an analysis of the problems of data protection more extensive, comprehensive and independent than anything that the Government have initiated so far? Should not that also cover information that they deliberately make public, which, in the case of the Land Registry information, has resulted in tens of millions of pounds of people's freehold property being robbed? And should not the lessons of all this be learned before we proceed with identity cards?

Des Browne: I am very aware of the issues the hon. Gentleman raises, and I cannot make it any clearer how seriously I take this matter. He knows how seriously I take such issues, from the time that I served as a Minister in Northern Ireland, when I dealt with him, his party colleagues and others in relation to similar matters. I am well aware of the potential security implications.
	It is clear that the protection of data is relevant to the identity cards scheme, but as the hon. Gentleman is probably aware, the scheme is underpinned by biometric data that will protect people's identities from being taken and/or used. That is the fundamental problem in relation to the loss of data, although there is a specific personal security problem in relation to the data in this case, which I understand. I do not think that the read-across that people constantly suggest in respect of ID cards is robust.
	I understand how important the issues that the hon. Gentleman raises are and I give him my word that I will do everything to ensure that they are taken seriously. As far as those who may be living and/or serving in Northern Ireland are concerned, I am not in a position to answer his question at this stage, but I am certain that some of the people concerned must be in Northern Ireland, and if they are exposed to any degree of risk, they will receive a letter from us, just as others involved will.

John Hemming: Had the database been on paper, we would be considering approximately 1 million sheets of paper weighing about five tonnes—not so easy to steal. Large databases are easy to copy and they come with large risks. Does the Secretary of State accept that the Government need to review seriously the holding of and access to large databases?

David Miliband: The real issue is the content of the treaty; and in its structure and consequence, as well as its content, it is different from the constitution and does not meet the bar of whether it constitutes fundamental constitutional change. I give way to the right hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley).

David Miliband: I shall give way to Members when I reach the end of this section, and I shall start with the right hon. Member for Wells (Mr. Heathcoat-Amory), who serves on the Foreign Affairs Committee.
	The Government also believe that Europe needs to reform its voting system to take account of enlargement. The treaty finally does that. In future, population size as well as the number of states is important to decision making. That will raise the proportion of votes in UK hands from 8 to 12 per cent.
	Furthermore—and to pick up on an earlier point—let me set out the facts on qualified majority voting. Sixteen of the changes either do not apply to the UK or apply only if we agree, because they concern economic and monetary union, of which we are not a part, or justice and home affairs, on which we have the ability to opt in or out.  [Interruption.] For as long as necessary: as I shall explain in detail, we will have the right to choose on all justice and home affairs measures.
	Fourteen of the QMV changes are purely procedural; for example, they address how we appoint members of the EU's Economic and Social Committee, or provisions relating to the effect of the past division of Germany. In 20 areas, the changes offer faster decision making where that is in the UK's interests, such as on energy liberalisation, where the chairmen of Centrica and the National Grid Company have said that the Lisbon treaty
	"will be a way of circumventing cases of protectionism",
	on aid to disaster zones, where representatives of 350 development non-government organisations have said that the treaty can
	"deliver a stronger poverty focus and greater coherence in"
	the EU's
	"development and humanitarian work",
	and on strengthening the EU's research and innovation capability, which will be of benefit to UK universities and research institutes.
	I am now happy to give way to the right hon. Member for Wells.

David Miliband: No.
	The Leader of the Opposition and the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks have said that if the countries of Europe pass the treaty, in the event of a future Conservative Government they will
	"not let the matter rest".
	The Conservative party needs 14 countries to back its drive not to let the matter rest. I hope that in the right hon. Gentleman's speech he will name one country—just one—that will support his quest to reopen the treaty—[Hon. Members: "Norway."] Norway is not yet in the European Union. The truth is that there is not even one such country, and what the Conservative commitment means is a further referendum pledge, renegotiation or withdrawal. It is important to look through the consequences.

Frank Field: Perhaps it will help the Liberals to nail their colours to the mast if I say that their proposal is rather a good idea. Voters in my area are certainly able to take a referendum with two questions. The first would be on whether they wanted to leave the European Union, and my guess is that they would, overwhelmingly, say no. The second would be on whether they wanted the treaty or constitution, and my guess is that they would say no to that, too.

David Blunkett: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for a very entertaining speech, but surely any Opposition party that aspires to government must answer the following question: given the change that took place following the defeat of the constitution by the French and Dutch voters, and the subsequent return to the table, which led to the protocols and opt-outs negotiated by the Government, what is it that the right hon. Gentleman believes he could achieve through the defeat of the treaty in a referendum, which would lead to us turning to the other 26 European Governments and asking them for something that he has not identified?

William Hague: No, I must proceed, in fairness to the rest of the House, at least for a little while.
	It is surprising that Ministers continue to repeat that line, when the European Scrutiny Committee told them in its report:
	"we do not consider that references to abandoning a 'constitutional concept'...are helpful and consider that they are even likely to be misleading in so far as they might suggest the Reform Treaty is of lesser significance than the Constitutional Treaty."
	As Giscard d'Estaing, who has already been quoted, put it in June,
	"public opinion will be led to adopt, without knowing it, the proposals that we dare not present to them 'directly'."
	He went on to say:
	"all the earlier proposals will be in the new text, but will be hidden and disguised in some way."
	Perhaps the most disarmingly honest description of what had happened came in that same month from the Belgian Foreign Minister, who said:
	"The aim of the Constitutional treaty was to be more readable; the aim of this treaty is to be unreadable...The Constitution aimed to be clear, whereas this treaty had to be unclear. It is a success."
	Dishonest as the process has been, other European Governments have at least been honest about the outcome. Not so the Government of the United Kingdom, who have persisted in the argument that the treaty is fundamentally different from the constitution. How could an impartial observer assess whether they are fundamentally different or substantially the same? The obvious way is to read the articles of the reform treaty and compare them to those of the constitution—a process undertaken by both the European Scrutiny Committee and the pressure group Open Europe. Both studies demonstrate that the vast majority of the provisions of the constitution are replicated, often word for word, in the reform treaty. According to one count, 240 of the 250 provisions of the constitution are repeated and restored.
	All along, the Government have been unwilling to be frank with Parliament about the process and the outcome. Ministers maintained until the middle of June that
	"nothing that you could really call negotiations have taken place",
	even though we now know that the negotiating Sherpas met on 24 January, 2 May and 15 May. Perhaps the Foreign Office officials who went along were just there as tourists. For all the effect they had on the outcome, they might as well have been.
	The criticism levelled at the Government's handling of Parliament has been exceptional. The Foreign Affairs Committee found that the 2007 intergovernmental conference mandate was agreed with little scope for UK public or parliamentary debate and engagement. That sets an unfortunate precedent, and is damaging to the credibility of the institutional reform process. The European Scrutiny Committee—we are talking about Committees with a Labour majority—reported that the
	"process could not have been better designed to marginalise the role of national parliaments and to curtail public debate."
	The story of the Government in the evolution of the treaty has been one of dissembling and deceit. They set out deliberately to break a firm election promise, denied Parliament and the public information about negotiations that were taking place, and refused to publish information that would help Parliament to come to an informed decision.

William Hague: That just shows that the Government have a case to answer. The implications of what my hon. Friend says will be far-reaching.
	The process of sustained deception has left us with a treaty with three principal failings. The first is that it is not necessary. A recent study by the London School of Economics concluded that
	"the 'business as usual' picture"
	of the EU
	"is more convincing than the 'gridlock' picture".
	The French Europe Minister recently admitted that
	"the thing that has most struck me since I took up this job seven months ago is precisely the capacity of an EU of 27 members, and more one day, to take decisions".
	The expansion of the EU to 27 members seems to have resulted in a greater readiness to reach consensus, and a decline in the use of the veto. The wholly welcome agreement on climate change last spring is an outstanding example. That the European Union can achieve a great deal by working together on such issues, and by pushing forward a free and genuine single market, is not in doubt. That makes it all the more extraordinary that one of the first aspects of the treaty agreed last June was the downgrading of the EU's long-standing commitment to undistorted competition. That change was secured by the French Government, with British Ministers apparently asleep at the wheel, although a protocol was hastily added to the treaty reaffirming the objective of free competition.
	European lawyers have been in no doubt about the implications, saying that
	"the excision of the competition principle from the front of the Treaty is a likely to have a number of damaging consequences for EC competition law."
	As far as we know, no effort has been made by the Government to restore "undistorted competition" to its rightful position in the objectives of the Union. It is a sad hallmark of the treaty that its provisions result from British Ministers having things done to them, rather than driven by them. The Foreign Secretary has said that the Conservative party is almost alone, apart from the Dutch Animals party, in its opposition to the treaty. We are not: vast tracts of provisions in the treaty have for many years been opposed by the Government themselves. As recently as June, they fought desperately to stop the EU high representative taking the chair at meetings of EU Foreign Ministers, but a provision for such chairmanship is in the treaty.
	When it was first proposed that EU member states on the UN Security Council should be obliged to ask the high representative to speak for the whole EU when there is a common position, the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), when he was the Foreign Office Minister representing the Government, asked for the entire provision to be struck out. However, it is in the treaty. Ministers argued against the creation of an EU diplomatic service, but now it is there. They argued against the self-amending nature of the treaty, but then gave in; they opposed the election of the President of the Commission by the European Parliament, but then capitulated; they tried to prevent employment, public health, consumer protection and transport networks becoming shared competencies with the EU, but they failed. They said they were
	"firmly opposed to establishing an European Public Prosecutor",
	but that function is now in the treaty; they insisted that the EU not be given an explicit legal personality, but it is now to be given such a personality; they said that qualified majority voting on proposals made by the European Foreign Minister was "simply unacceptable", but QMV is now there. They objected to the article on the common union defence policy, but then agreed to it; they opposed the EU having the power to set minimum criminal penalties, but then gave in; they said they would not accept the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice over the third pillar area of justice and home affairs, but they capitulated on that as well. That is not even an exhaustive list. The Government's motto as the treaty has been created is, "Anything for a quiet life, and never mind the national interest."

William Hague: The former Prime Minister, Mr. Tony Blair, stood at the Dispatch Box and told the House of Commons that at his insistence, the question of a legal personality for the EU had been removed from earlier negotiations. He felt so strongly about the issue that the Government eventually went with the flow of the argument in Europe, rather than stick up for their view.
	Let me move on, given the passage of time. Our next principal objection to the treaty is that it damages the British national interest and weakens democracy by setting up a process of continuing integration beyond the control of the electorate. When Ministers say they are happy to sign the treaty but are opposed to any further political integration after that, they are merely continuing the habit of deception that I detailed earlier. The whole point of the treaty is to create a process of further integration, not to bring a stop to it. As the Italian Prime Minister, Romano Prodi, put it:
	"As long as we have more or less a European Prime Minister and a European Foreign Minister then we can give them almost any title".
	That is how many other countries see the treaty, but it is not how it is described by the Government. The creation of a permanent President of the European Council, elected for two and a half years at a time by majority voting, is a major constitutional innovation in the European Union, and is intended as such. We are all conscious in this Parliament, or we should be, of the way in which the job of First Lord of the Treasury evolved in Britain, steadily developing a grip over Cabinet Departments previously independent of it, and developing into the post of Prime Minister.
	The creation of that job took many years—and the present Prime Minister probably feels that it took almost as long to get round to his turn to hold it. To see how the post of a permanent President of the European Council could evolve is not difficult even for the humblest student of politics, and it is, of course, rumoured that one Tony Blair may be interested in the job. If that prospect makes us uncomfortable on the Conservative Benches, just imagine how it will be viewed in Downing street! I must warn Ministers that having tangled with Tony Blair across the Dispatch Box on hundreds of occasions, I know his mind almost as well as they do. I can tell them that when he goes off to a major political conference of a centre-right party and refers to himself as a socialist, he is on manoeuvres, and is busily building coalitions as only he can.
	We can all picture the scene at a European Council sometime next year. Picture the face of our poor Prime Minister as the name "Blair" is nominated by one President and Prime Minister after another: the look of utter gloom on his face at the nauseating, glutinous praise oozing from every Head of Government, the rapid revelation of a majority view, agreed behind closed doors when he, as usual, was excluded. Never would he more regret no longer being in possession of a veto: the famous dropped jaw almost hitting the table, as he realises there is no option but to join in. And then the awful moment when the motorcade of the President of Europe sweeps into Downing street. The gritted teeth and bitten nails: the Prime Minister emerges from his door with a smile of intolerable anguish; the choking sensation as the words, "Mr President", are forced from his mouth. And then, once in the Cabinet room, the melodrama of, "When will you hand over to me?" all over again.
	There is, of course, a serious point to be made. Occupied by someone with the political skill of our former Prime Minister, that post would become, in not so many years, a far more substantial one than the Government pretend. The President would be seen as the president of Europe by the rest of the world, with the role of national Governments steadily reduced and the role of national democracy and accountability steadily weakened. The naivety of Ministers, who think that by signing the treaty they are agreeing to a static constitutional position, is alarming in people with such senior responsibilities. "Ah," they say, "look at the enhanced role of national Parliaments set out in the Treaty." If a majority in half the Parliaments in the EU object to an EU measure, they might be able to block it.
	Again, it does not take much of a political analyst to work out that the chances of that mechanism being employed on any regular basis are vanishingly small. It could be used only if 14 different national Parliaments, nearly all of which have a Government majority, defeated an EU proposal, and did so within an eight-week period. We only have to consider that for a moment, as Members of Parliament, to begin to laugh about it. Given the difficulty of Oppositions winning a vote in their Parliaments, the odds against doing so in 14 countries around Europe with different parliamentary recesses—lasting up to 10 weeks in our own case—are such that even if the European Commission proposed the slaughter of the first-born it would be difficult to achieve such a remarkable conjunction of parliamentary votes.
	The last defence of Ministers on the Treaty is that they have achieved the defence of their red lines. As the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty), the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, has judged, the red lines "leak like a sieve". The red lines will be much debated over the coming weeks, but the central fact to remember about them is that the Government claimed to have achieved exactly the same red lines when they signed the European constitution and proposed a referendum.
	That brings me back to our strongest objection of all to the Bill. The Government's contention that the treaty is so different from the European constitution that they are relieved of their promise to hold a referendum is shared by few independent observers, and not even by the members of their own party who have given the most time and commitment to the process. As the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) explained to the Prime Minister—I hope that I shall not embarrass her by quoting her—
	"sticking to your guns in defence of a patently dishonest position is not leadership, but the soft option, and a cop-out from a specific promise made to voters."
	Whatever the niceties of the argument, by no stretch of the imagination is the treaty so different from the constitution as to relieve the Government of their promise. Every survey on the subject has shown that the vast majority in our country would like to have their say. In the words of the Belgian Foreign Minister, the Government are banking on the treaty being too unreadable for people to worry about it. However, the treaty's constitutional innovations are sufficiently sweeping, and its erosion of our national democracy sufficiently serious, that many of us will have no hesitation not only in voting against it, but in voting for a referendum at every opportunity.

Mike Gapes: No. I have only eight minutes and I want to make some progress.
	Paragraph 220 states:
	"the creation of the post of High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and of the European External Action Service, represent major innovations in the EU's foreign policy-making machinery."
	It goes on to say that the new post and service do not
	"risk undermining the Common Foreign and Security Policy's intergovernmental nature".
	However,
	"the Government is underestimating, and certainly downplaying in public, the significance of their creation."
	I therefore welcome the fact that today the Foreign Secretary started to make the positive case for the proposals. I personally believe that more should have been done last year, before the intergovernmental conference in June and again before the intergovernmental discussions in October, to explain things to the public and Parliament. The Committee is critical—I do not resile from that—of the fact that we were not in the loop last June, when those issues were under consideration. However, that does not mean that the treaty proposals should be opposed, and I should like to make a number of other points on that.
	The Lisbon treaty raises concerns about how the post of high representative for foreign affairs and security policy could work. The Committee wants more information about that as we fear that the relevant individual, whoever they are—whether Mr. Solana or a successor—could face work overload because of the large burdens of foreign policy representation, chairing Council of Ministers meetings and having a role in the Commission. That issue needs to be considered in some detail.
	In addition, as has already been mentioned, the Lisbon treaty provides for the high representative to speak at the United Nations Security Council. However, as our report states in paragraph 157, that
	"will make little difference to current practice. It will not undermine the position of the UK in the United Nations system nor the UK's representation and role as a Permanent Member of the Security Council."
	The reshaped role of the president of the European Council has already been mentioned. We believe that that
	"could help to generate consensus among EU leaders and lead to greater continuity in the chairing of the European Council. However, we are concerned by the current degree of uncertainty which surrounds the role and by the potential for conflict with the High Representative in representing the EU externally."
	However, we need more information about how that will work in practice.
	There is also the question of how the external action service will work. We believe that it may reduce
	"duplication between the Council Secretariat and the Commission"
	and facilitate
	"the development of more effective EU external policies, operating in parallel with rather than as a substitute for national diplomatic services."
	We also believe that the service offers the opportunity for
	"a greater intermingling of national and EU personnel and careers."
	However, we are concerned about how that will work in practice and we want to be sure that British Foreign Office officials seconded to the service see it as a good move in their career development. They should be able to come back to our Foreign and Commonwealth Office and have a proper representative role. We want working for the service to enhance career prospects.
	Finally, we believe that
	"the Commission's loss of the right to make Common Foreign and Security Policy proposals is welcome because it represents an important assertion of the intergovernmental nature of the Common Foreign and Security Policy."
	We all want more effective co-operation and co-ordination between the European Union's 27 member states. However, there has been ambiguity about how the foreign and security policy works because of the role of the Commission. The treaty clarifies that issue: it makes it explicit that the policy is intergovernmental. It moves current Commission staff away from the Commission and puts them under the high representative, who is accountable to the Council of Ministers.
	The process is therefore clearly intergovernmental and will work only if very competent people are in those jobs. We need to ensure that high-level people are appointed and that high-level people from our own Foreign and Commonwealth Office play a role in the process. In that way, when the treaty is adopted by the 27 member states next year, and when it begins to come into effect in 2009, we will be sure that British personnel and influence are at the heart of the new European Union foreign and security policy structures—not marginalised as, sadly, they would be if some Members of the House had their way.

Edward Davey: The hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes) and his Committee have given an analysis that confirms that the Lisbon treaty keeps foreign policy on an inter-governmental basis but makes changes to the institutional workings that will enable British foreign policy to be more effective. The hon. Gentleman concentrated on what is actually in the treaty. The Conservatives objected to the speech by the Foreign Secretary, who addressed what is actually in the treaty, not the mythical monsters that some Members of this House wish to conjure up. His main argument was that the Lisbon treaty's prime purpose is to improve how the enlarged European Union works. We agree.
	The truth is that the Lisbon treaty is, to quote Lord Howe, "entirely sensible"—so much so that very few political parties in Europe oppose it, besides the rag-bag of parties to which the Foreign Secretary referred. Currently, the Conservatives are in the European People's party in Strasbourg, but not one other member of the European People's party agrees with the Conservatives. Perhaps the Conservatives are going to leave the EPP—we do not know; they seem unsure about it—but they have indicated that, if and when they do so, they want to work with the Czech ODS party, which, interestingly, is in favour of the treaty and against a referendum on it.

Edward Davey: I totally agree with the hon. Lady. She has made a case for the Liberal Democrat position on a referendum on Britain's membership of the European Union.
	The case for the EU is there, both in the history books and in the well-known future challenges for our country and our world. Fifty years ago, would anyone have predicted decades of peace in northern Europe, such that the very idea of war between millennial adversaries has become unthinkable? Forty years ago, could we have hoped for the ending of the dictatorships that littered southern Europe? Thirty years ago, would anyone have predicted the reunification of Europe, with communism finished and democracy taking root in central and eastern Europe?
	I do not seek to credit the European ideal or Union alone with those achievements, but equally, to deny a central role for the EU in our modern day and in our future peace and prosperity is historically illiterate. When we look ahead to climate change, to the fight against terrorism, to defeating internationally organised crime and to meeting the global economic challenges, I frankly find it inconceivable to believe that we would be better equipped without the EU, and without a strengthened EU.
	That is the challenge for our Prime Minister. He talks sensibly about a global Europe. He describes himself as a pro-European realist. He sets out an attractive agenda, beyond Lisbon, of completing the single market and focusing Europe on enterprise, innovation and skills. Yet he seems to go out of his way to lose friends and lose influence in Europe—from snubbing the other 26 EU leaders at the signing of the Lisbon treaty, to the provocation of calling a European economic summit in London at the end of this month to which only France, Germany and Italy have been invited. The Foreign Secretary has been put in an impossible position, trying to build alliances and partnerships throughout the EU, while the Prime Minister cuts across him.
	It is good to sign new trade deals with China, but when it comes to the crunch, who should be our closest and strongest allies? It is surely those countries that are democracies, that abide by the rule of law and that respect human rights. Indeed, it is through the power of the EU collectively that we are far more likely to influence China on the road to liberal democracy. It is time that the Prime Minister learned to love the EU and see it for what it really is, outside the broken kaleidoscope of Mr. Murdoch's editorial rooms.
	Having made the case for the treaty and for the EU, let me come to the issue of referendums. Do we support a referendum on the Lisbon treaty? As my immediate predecessor as foreign and commonwealth affairs spokesman, my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (Mr. Moore), said in this House:
	"In our judgment, the changes made to create this amending treaty have altered its constitutional significance, so we should not hold a referendum on it."—[ Official Report, 12 November 2007; Vol. 467, c. 430.]
	I share his view. Instead, we argue for a different referendum—a referendum on Britain's membership of the European Union. Let us face it: a referendum on any EU treaty would become a referendum on the UK's continued membership. Let us not have that debate by proxy on a treaty referendum. Let us have a debate that people want by asking a straightforward, in or out question.

David Heathcoat-Amory: Surely treaties should be judged by their practical and legal effect. That is why two Select Committees of this House, which included Liberal Democrat among its members, concluded that in practical and legal substance, the two treaties are the same. Why does the hon. Gentleman not accept that?

Michael Connarty: The process that seems to have been generated tonight has added a number of things to the debate that have not been present so far. One such addition was the overall argument proposed by the Foreign Secretary that, despite all the other arguments, he supports the measure because it will improve the working of the EU. That is echoed again and again when I speak to representatives from other countries. It has certainly, I have no doubt, improved the tenor of the debate in the House of Commons. Not only has it improved the humour, which I have found to be most welcome among the genuine and manufactured emotions that such debates always generate, but we will also have 10 days of debate on the policy areas covered by the treaty and the EU. That means that the UK Government will have the chance to give their view on those policy areas as well as the actions that they want to take. That will be welcome. If that is the sum of the positives that the European Scrutiny Committee generates for the Government, that is reward enough.
	The treaty of Lisbon will bring a solution to the institutional problems; there is no doubt about that, because the treaty agreed before that one was inadequate. The treaty of Lisbon will create a smaller Commission, which everyone welcomes, and a more balanced voting pattern in Council, with a better voting balance for the UK. It will bring in double majority voting on the qualified majority vote, which is also welcome.
	The treaty will introduce a five-term presidency. People keep calling it a permanent presidency, but it will cover five six-month periods, creating a two-and-a-half-year presidency with a maximum of two terms. I welcome the fact that someone will be appointed who is not a member of the Commission and whose loyalty will be to the European Council and the Governments that sit on that Council.
	The treaty will also introduce an EU high representative for foreign and security policy. Unfortunately, that person will also be a Commission vice-president and, oddly enough, the chair of the Foreign Affairs Council. I would have thought that the Foreign Affairs Committee might have said that it was a step too far to give that person, who is really a Commission member, the chairmanship of a Council of Ministers. That person will also be given the right to speak in the UN and to sign on behalf of the EU when all 27 countries are unanimous. I spoke today to people from Hungary and to their Foreign Secretary. It made sense to them, and to the representatives of most of the small countries in the 27, to have such a person who speaks on their behalf and gives them more priority. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes) said, that will not take away any power from the two permanent members of the UN Security Council—France and the UK—which was rumoured to be one of the problems that some had with the proposal.
	The main aim of the treaty is a final move to what is called the Community method, which people must consider again and again. The preferred Community method of policy making is QMV in the Council with amendment rights and co-decision-making by the European Parliament, enforcement by the Commission and final appeal not to the courts in people's own lands but to the European Court of Justice. That is the new heart of the treaty. It is a new settlement, a more European settlement and a more Eurocentric settlement. That is not to say that I oppose that. We must accept that that is where Europe is going. We must either be there, influencing Europe in that format in the future, or we must walk away. There is no middle ground. We are choosing tonight. I shall vote for this treaty, because I believe that we should be moving into the centre ground.
	The Foreign Secretary is a bit like King Canute, who is much maligned, because he set out to demonstrate that the tide could not be held back. The right hon. Gentleman has shown today that he, too, believes that the tide cannot be held back. Unfortunately, I believe that the ebb tide—people must accept this—will take the centre of power away from this Parliament to Brussels. There is no doubt about that. At present, before the Lisbon treaty goes through, the balance of power is held between the Commission, the UK Government in Council and that derived from the scrutiny of the UK Parliament. That balance is similar in each member state. Eventually, because of unanimity, it is possible to appeal to the UK courts to judge how the power should be applied. After the treaty is up and running, and after the five years that it will take to erode—or to leak—the red lines that we have set on all the areas that we have opted into, the balance will be between the Commission, national Governments in Council and the European Parliament.
	The role of national Parliaments will be massively diminished. In fact, as recently as December it was suggested by European parliamentarians from a number of parties at a Future of Europe conference, that our Parliaments' role will be to try to influence the European Parliament, so that it can make the appropriate amendments to what comes out of the Council. As Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, I am not prepared to accept that.

Malcolm Rifkind: It is right that there should be great passion in the House about Europe because Europe and Britain's role in it is one of the great issues, for not only us, but the rest of our continent. The question is not whether we should be in the European Union but the sort of Europe that we wish to develop and whether Britain can be comfortable in it.
	The House is being asked to determine two matters today. The first is the referendum and the second is whether the treaty, regardless of the referendum, deserves the House's support. The Foreign Secretary's attempt to create a new explanation for why the Government committed themselves to a referendum is unconvincing. The former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, made it clear that he believed that the people should have their say on such an important matter. The Government's fear of losing such a referendum has made them change their position. It is not a question of the legitimacy of the treaty if there is no referendum, but of severe damage and erosion to the public's faith in Government.
	However, the second matter is far more difficult—indeed, more difficult than some of the speeches have suggested. The question whether a treaty deserves our support is usually expressed in absolute terms. Many hon. Members are happy to describe themselves as hard-line Eurosceptics, who would be content for the country to leave the European Union and would oppose any treaty, whatever its terms. Others are instinctively sympathetic to whatever emanates from the EU and want to be positive towards it. For what it is worth, I describe myself as a moderate Eurosceptic. I am against the single currency and many of the EU's aspirations. I have therefore tried to consider the matter objectively and ascertain whether the criticisms of the treaty have substance or are exaggerated.
	The criticisms have some substance, but not as much as is often suggested. If, for example, one considers whether there is significance in going from a treaty to a constitution or a constitution to a treaty, the critics are right that 95 per cent. of the documents are exactly the same. However, I am delighted that the treaty is no longer described as a constitution. Although calling it a constitution did not make the EU a state, it nevertheless disclosed a state of mind that wished to move Europe in that direction. When the document was called a constitution, included a proposal for "a Foreign Minister" and referred to flags and anthems, it contained all the paraphernalia of a state or state in the making. Although the treaty is not substantively different, I welcome the change in terminology.
	To those who disagree, let me say that I remember debates in the House when the European Assembly was becoming a Parliament. It was argued that the word "Parliament" was significant, regardless of any other change of powers. It is important to make such distinctions. The European Court of Justice may have to interpret the significance of the document one day. If it is a constitution, the court could grant it the same significance in overruling other legislation as the Supreme Court in the United States would grant to the US constitution.
	The proposal for a president is unnecessary. It is not an absolute requirement and I would be happy if it was not there. However, I refuse to accept that it has the sinister implications that are sometimes suggested. The person concerned will be a president of the European Council and his powers will be substantively the same as those that the president of the European Council has held for several years. He will be appointed for two and a half years, and therefore undoubtedly have more influence. However, he will be more like a President of Switzerland than a President of the United States. He will be an ambassador. Perhaps Tony Blair would be an adequate choice because, as with his current job in the middle east, the president of the European Council will argue the views of other people. In the case of the European Union, that would be the view of Governments in the organisation.
	I do not believe that a high representative is necessary, but most people should welcome the combination of two jobs—that of the External Affairs Commissioner and that of the High Representative.
	I set myself a fundamental test. If the proposals are accepted, would the British Government—whoever are the Government—be prevented from initiating British policy in the most crucial matters, which affect our national interest? If the terms had been in effect some years ago, would we have been unable—for good or ill—to go to war in Iraq against the wishes of most of the other countries of Europe? Would we have been able to defend our interests in the Falkland Islands or pursue our policy on other aspects of foreign policy? Only if the answer to those questions is no can we pass the rather dramatic judgment that is sometimes expressed. I am not keen on some aspects of the powers, but we should get them into proper perspective if we are not to do ourselves a disservice.
	However, the most significant aspect is the opt-outs that the Government have negotiated, if they are watertight. The Government have a long way to go to prove that they are watertight. If they can do so, the facts that the charter of fundamental rights will not be justiciable and that we will not be bound by justice and home affairs matters unless we so wish, are important.

Malcolm Rifkind: I accept that it is an opt-in, but that has—or is claimed to have—the same practical effect on the fundamentals.
	My point is wider than the importance of such measures for justice, home affairs and the charter of fundamental rights. If we are to have a long-term future in the new EU, it can be only on the basis of a EU that accepts what is often described as variable geometry: different member states determining for themselves the amount of integration that they are prepared to accept. I can live with our membership of the EU because we are moving in that direction, not because I have a naive belief that many in the EU will not continue to strive for a federal outcome—I have no doubt that they will. As long as we in the UK are not forced to follow them, I can live with our membership.
	We are not in the single currency and we are not in Schengen. If it can be demonstrated that the charter of fundamental rights will not be justiciable and cannot, therefore, overturn our national law; if we can make decisions about justice and home affairs, and if member states have a similar right to decide for themselves the parts of future proposals for integration that they are prepared to accept, we should find that sort of EU acceptable and be prepared to live with it.
	I make this sober point to my colleagues: we are a party that remains committed to our membership of the EU. That means that, if one is a member of a European Union with 27 member states, conclusions will occasionally be reached that we do not like. Compromise is required because that is the nature of any international organisation. That should be acceptable to us in the context of our sovereignty and national interest, if we can opt out and decline to be part of the process on issues to which we attach great importance. That is the way in which the EU is currently evolving. If—it is a big "if"—the treaty will move us further in that direction because of the opt-outs or opt-ins, we should welcome it.
	The Government are acting in bad faith on the referendum. Regardless of the merits of the treaty, they made a promise to the British public and it is foolish and against their interests to deny that. They make themselves look petty, mean and unconvincing by doing that.
	On the wider question of the treaty, we should be critical of those aspects that we do not like—I have not had time to refer to many elements that I personally do not like—but we do ourselves no service and do nothing to support our interests if we exaggerate the problem. The Government have much work to do.

Kenneth Clarke: I am in favour of the ratification of the treaty of Lisbon, so I shall be supporting the Second Reading of the Bill tonight. I am also totally opposed to the whole idea of having a referendum on this or similar treaties. Referendums are not part of our British constitution, and I regret the fact that they are in constant danger of becoming such.
	My views should come as no surprise to anybody—I am sure that they do not—as I spoke and voted accordingly on the 2004 treaty that was originally put forward. I am astonished to find, three years later, that we are having such an agitated debate. As we have had a general election since, I am one of the few Members of the House who fought the last election on the basis that I am now putting forward. It is true that my party's manifesto said differently, but no person who follows politics in my constituency can conceivably have imagined that I supported that part of the manifesto. Indeed, I was quite clear about that to the very few people who bothered to raise the subject with me—I have received six or seven letters on the subject in the past five years. I therefore feel no sense of a lack of democratic legitimacy in putting forward my view.

Kenneth Clarke: I can reassure my right hon. Friend that I personally regard myself as bound by the commitment, which I was persuaded by the then Prime Minister to enter into, that we would have a referendum on the single currency. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington and Chelsea took part in persuading me and the now Lord Heseltine to agree to that, but I have frequently said, and I repeat now, that it is the biggest mistake I have ever made in my political career.
	I have consistently argued and voted against referendums on the European Communities Acts, the Single European Act, the Maastricht treaty, and the treaty of Amsterdam and so on. I am quite sure that had a Conservative Government remained in office after 1997 and had we negotiated a treaty of the kind that eventually came to pass in Lisbon, we would not even have contemplated having a referendum. We were always consistent in the past, and I remain consistent now.

Kenneth Clarke: I regret having to turn my back on one of my oldest personal friends in the House. I agree with him entirely: we would have wished to have negotiated this treaty following the enlargement of the Community. Mrs. Thatcher always regarded referendums as instruments that were useful to dictators and others who wished to get round Parliament.
	I want to ask myself how we got into this situation. I now find myself in the Chamber surrounded by people who are wildly agitated about the question of a referendum when actually a majority of them went through the last election saying that they wanted a referendum on this subject. I am afraid that I blame the previous Prime Minister. He entirely shared my view of referendums on European treaties. Indeed, he told me so when I had a conversation with him on the subject. More importantly, however, he told more important people than me that he was against holding a referendum—most particularly, President Chirac, whom he assured that he would not have a referendum.
	I now move into theory, rather than reporting what Tony Blair told me, but I am quite convinced that the only reason that he startled me, and most of his own party, by completely changing his position on this question was that he had had conversations with Mr. Rupert Murdoch. With the approach of a general election, he was absolutely desperate—as new Labour Ministers, for some curious reason, always are—to have the support of  The Sun, and a deal was done that he would hold a referendum on this treaty, which, for some reason, he was confident that he would win, in exchange for Murdoch not turning  The Sun against him at the election. I do not regard that as the basis for a great move forward in the British constitution.
	I personally think that referendums are a way of weakening Parliament and getting round parliamentary authority in regard to key issues of this kind. I have never accepted that they should be the way forward. For example, the House should vote this evening that it is in favour of the Bill and of the treaty. If we were then to hold a kind of organised opinion poll in which the right-wing press would seek to achieve the result that it wanted, and if ratification of the treaty were defeated, would we all be expected to come back to the House and vote against our judgment of the national interest in line with the result of the referendum? And who on earth is going to tell us what to do in the circumstances that would follow that? That is a question to which I hope briefly to turn in a moment.
	I am not remotely impressed by the absurd argument that the treaty is different from the last treaty, although I welcome some of the changes. That is a theological nonsense from people who regret having got themselves into this position and are now trying to get out of it. They are at least now moving to a better position. Nor do I agree with all this red line nonsense as a way of describing the negotiations. It has been a mistake made by British Governments over the years to present their European policies as though they are always going to Brussels to fight demons, and to achieve great victories by beating off threats to our interests. The fact that every Prime Minister since Edward Heath has used that approach to describe such negotiations is one reason why the public have turned so Eurosceptic over the years.
	Instead of going through the pantomime of refusing to sign a treaty, that he had negotiated and agreed to, in the company of the other Government leaders, the present Prime Minister should have concentrated—as should the previous Prime Minister—on presenting the public with his argument on why he had negotiated and signed the treaty, and why he believed that it was in the British interest to ratify it. Instead, he followed inglorious precedents by trying to pretend that he was not really there at the time when the document emerged, which is no way to sell it.
	I am pro-European, as everyone here knows, and I will not labour my reasons for so being. Pro-Europeans should support a treaty that will improve the workings of the present institutions. I am persuaded that it is no longer essential that an enlarged Community should have to have the new treaty, but the mechanisms for decision making in the Union will be very much improved if we adopt it, compared with what we have at the moment. For that reason, I support it.
	I am in favour of the new arrangements for the presidency. It is nonsense to suggest that the President of the European Council will be some kind of giant political figure, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington and Chelsea has just said. I actually think that the new arrangements will be an improvement on the six-monthly national presidencies. Now that we have 27 member states, the present system would involve the Head of Government of each member state coming along once every 13 or 14 years with an agenda for the next six months. All too often, such agendas are aimed at domestic political opinion. Under the new system, we shall have some consistency.
	I believe that having one foreign affairs spokesman, rather than two, is an improvement. The new arrangements are perfectly satisfactory because they confirm the intergovernmental nature of foreign policy-making. I am all in favour of having a smaller Commission. That is essential and long overdue, although I am amazed that it has been achieved. The new treaty actually strengthens the power of the Councils of Ministers—accountable to Parliaments—at the expense of the Commission. I would have been worried if things had gone too far in that direction, because we need quite a strong Commission to keep the European institutions functioning. However, a smaller Commission is long overdue. I also approve of the improvement of the qualified majority voting system.
	I also believe that, although I supported the original treaty, there were real problems with the precise status of the charter of fundamental rights. I was alarmed that quite sensible employers and a number of trade union leaders appeared to believe that a re-statement of the undoubted right to strike meant that, somehow, the European Court was going to reopen all our trade union law. I always thought that that was barrack room lawyer nonsense, but—although I have been rude about the red lines—the changes that have been made between the Giscardian treaty and the present one represent an improvement that clarifies the situation and should put those arguments to rest.
	Why do I take this view, when I find myself surrounded by colleagues who take quite alarming views? At least no one has yet gone as far as  The Sun, which has declared to its readers that this treaty, if ratified, will result in the end of Britain as an independent state. I have heard that argument used against the European Communities Act 1972, against the Single European Act and against Maastricht. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) used it against the Amsterdam treaty. It is less likely to be true in this case than it ever was in any of the previous ones. People will conclude that we are going to lose control of our foreign policy, for example, only if they believe that the European Union is some kind of organised conspiracy in which the other 26 member states are prepared to sacrifice their sovereignty in order to destroy ours. I do not believe that, and I therefore support the Bill.

Frank Cook: Perhaps I should remind the House that although I am a simple soul, I am not stupid. I was soft enough, however, to allow myself to be persuaded to chair the Joint Committee of the House of Lords and House of Commons when our delegates to the Convention were bringing back their reports to the House. So I have some knowledge of this matter, albeit slightly second hand. That is why I found the tone of the original protestations that prefaced the debate today somewhat hollow. With the exception of the delegates who came back to present their reports, I do not think that the Committee ever saw more than six Members of this House. They would get up and make a statement, then get out as soon as they could. Alternatively, they would take advantage of the first Division in the House to go down and vote. I am sure that they did vote, but they certainly did not take the trouble to return to the Committee. We therefore found ourselves with a plethora of Members of the other place who were prepared to discuss these matters, but we did not get much feedback from this Chamber. I have therefore found today's protestations somewhat false.
	However, I welcome the comments of the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind). He put his finger on what this is really about. This is only the Second Reading debate, so these proceedings will go on for some time. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that the debate was about two decisions: one on a referendum, and one on the treaty. Anyone who has been in the Chamber throughout today's proceedings will know that we have spent at least two hours, probably more, discussing a referendum. Only in the last three speeches have we been able to get down to the nuts and bolts of the treaty—the essential matter that we should be discussing.
	I am at a loss to know why we should have this problem with the referendum. Residents of Norton in my constituency told me that they wanted a parish council, so I told them to have a referendum, which they did. They knocked on doors—but only on the doors of people who wanted a parish council, so they were disbarred for not allowing anyone to vote against it. However, the residents of Billingham had a lot more sense: they knocked on all doors, and got a resounding yes. They now have a parish council. Fine.
	We had a referendum on having a north-eastern regional assembly; every door was knocked on then, but we ended up with a resounding no. I seem to recall that Hartlepool and Middlesbrough had referendums on whether they should elect a mayor. They both received "yes" answers, though the one voted in a monkey and the other a policeman. Stockton had much more sense in its referendum, saying that it did not want an elected mayor anyway. Then there was Scotland, which acquired an Assembly; as did Wales, but it had a referendum in which only half the people participated, and only half of those said they wanted a Parliament.
	We have already used referendums, as I have shown, so why do we not just agree to have one, which would allow us to save all the time we have wasted on debate tonight? We could get into Committee, discuss the details of what is and is not in the treaty and achieve some sort of sensible resolution, without all the wasted breath. Ironically, while I am for a referendum, I am also for the treaty. I shall vote for it on the basis that it is an improvement, moving towards regularisation and providing a more disciplined approach when an increasing number of nations are trying to work together. I therefore appeal to my Front Benchers: for heaven's sake, reconsider having a referendum. If they did, three quarters of the people on the Conservative Benches would have nothing left to say!

Ian Paisley: I wish I could answer yes to that, but I cannot because there are some money limitations and we do not have the authority so far—but we are discussing that matter at the moment. If Northern Ireland wants to express a view on this, I feel that it should be entitled to do so within this United Kingdom. Even if it is only a consultative thing, it does not matter, as the people will be given the opportunity to express their views. I think that Scotland may like to do the same, but I would not dare to speak for Scotland, even though my mother was a Scot from Morningside in Edinburgh.
	I sat in the European Parliament for a very long time. As we look to the future, it is sad to see that people's ambitions to do something for Europe have been set aside and that tonight we are spending time debating whether the people of the United Kingdom are allowed to say yes or no. That is the real purpose of this debate. It is simple. Then, if they are allowed to say yes or no, it is settled. The people speak and if we are democrats, we have to bow to what they say. The people may do something that we may not admire, but that is democracy. We must hear what the people have to say.
	From where I stand and as I look at it, I do not want to be an enemy of Europe. I know that because when I go abroad to sell Northern Ireland, I know how much we need the help and friendship of the rest of the globe. I want to be a friend of Europe, but I also want to be a good friend of my own country and I want to stand up for the principles that made our country great in the past and that can make her great again. As I go around the world, I find many people looking to the United Kingdom. They say, "Yes, you folks succeeded in many ways"—and so we did—and I trust that we will succeed again as a nation.
	I believe that the Government should look very carefully at the question of the referendum and they should not be so hasty. After all, they were converted to it originally, back in 2005, when we heard that it was
	"a good treaty for Britain and for the new Europe".
	It was said that it would be put to the British people in a referendum and that the Government would "campaign wholeheartedly" for a yes vote to keep Britain a "leading nation in Europe". It was Labour who argued for that. Indeed, Mr. Blair himself said that we should not reject the treaty, only to bring it back with just a few amendments to have another go at it, yet that is exactly what the Government are now attempting to do. Those are their own statements and I could repeat many more.
	I also mention the French President, who at a closed meeting in Europe said that he could not win a referendum. He prophesied that Gordon Brown could not win it either. He said that we would just have to hold out for this referendum. According to a survey conducted by the EU itself, only 39 per cent. of the people of Britain are reckoned to be in favour of EU membership, and that is not the majority of the people. That can be tested. The Government would be wise to think again. It is no skin off anybody's nose to lose an election. The person who loses an election had the guts to put his views and to say, "Here's what I believe. I want you to endorse it." I have fought elections and lost them, and fought elections and won them. We should have our finality in the ballot box and let the people speak.

Mark Hendrick: My hon. Friend knows very well that the unions are now on board with the treaty and do not oppose it.
	Much has been made of the similarity between the reform treaty and the constitution, but there have been many changes. Unlike the constitution, the reform treaty contains no symbols of statehood, such as provision for a flag or an anthem; it includes an explicit provision for EU competences to return to member states if countries agree; it makes no reference to the primacy of EU law; it strengthens the powers of scrutiny for national parliaments; it keeps the common foreign and security policy in a separate treaty; it adds two declarations confirming that all member countries see foreign policy as the responsibility of member states; it contains new clear language excluding European Court of Justice jurisdiction over CFSP affairs; it contains a UK-specific legally binding protocol on the charter; and it states for the first time that national security is the sole responsibility of member states.
	Under the reform treaty, the European Council will have a full-time chairperson or president. European leaders will choose a president for up to two and a half years. The present system whereby a member state has the presidency for six months might have worked with 12 or 15 states, but with 27 member states it becomes unworkable: smaller countries struggle with the overwhelming task of running a complex agenda; bigger countries mix up national priorities with the EU interest; and rotation means too little follow-up. The president of the Council will be appointed as the servant of the leaders of national Governments and the purpose is to strengthen the Council of national Governments in relation to other EU institutions; and that is similarly the case with the high representative. The EU's national leaders, not the president, will take all the final decisions when they meet together.
	Increasingly, the concerns of British citizens lie outside our borders. The challenges of climate change, international terrorism and economic migration mean that international relations can no longer be separated from our day-to-day lives.

Charles Kennedy: For some of us, this debate and what it presages impart a degree of nostalgia. Those of us who went through the nightmare experience of Maastricht and the ratification process—I was a Europe spokesman for our party at the time—are returning, 15 years later, to something that may be similar but which we hope will not be too similar, in terms of both political drama and the hours involved.
	I have two recollections from that period. One is of the emergence of the so-called night watchmen. Some are still with us, fellow survivors. I think of the hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash), who is sitting at the back of the Chamber now, and of others such as Sir Teddy Taylor, the up-and-coming young right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith), and Jonathan Aitken. The procedures of the House at the time meant that we sat literally throughout the night. My other recollection is of emerging, blinking, into the morning to observe the passage of the seasons as the process unfolded over the months and months that it took. I think that parliamentary procedures have changed for the better since then. Let us hope that the general tenor of our discussion over the coming weeks will also have improved over the intervening decade and a half, and that we do not experience another debate in which the indefatigable meets the interminable.
	I do not want to make my brief speech in any particular party-political context, because that has already been done. I want to say a few words in the context of my position as president of the European Movement, an all-party organisation that also contains many individuals of non-party-political affiliation.

Charles Kennedy: The experience of all political parties suggests that when former leaders are asked to interpret policy on behalf of their successors they are rarely helpful to anyone, least of all the successor in question. None the less, my sense of parliamentary duty leads me to try to be helpful.
	My answer is simply this. I voted for a referendum over Maastricht, for example. At that point our number were split almost 50:50, and the split was almost generational. Those who, like me, had not been around at the time of the previous referendum were enthusiastic about the idea, while those who had—people such as David Steel, Russell Johnston and Bob Maclennan—were definitely not. It was an interesting gauge at the time.
	I have always taken the view that, at some point in British politics, there must be a further redefining referendum on the European issue. What form it might take and on what hook it might have to be hung, whether it be Maastricht, a single currency or the original prospect of a constitution which has now evolved—I use that word to be as neutral as possible—into the treaty revision in Lisbon, a referendum to lance the European boil one way or another in British politics cannot be averted indefinitely. Indeed, I am surprised that it has not happened already.
	To pick from the comments of the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) about discussing some of these matters during his private conversations with Tony Blair in the run-up to the last election, I remember having equivalent, separate private conversations along similar lines, when the then Prime Minister was trying to persuade me, as Liberal Democrat leader, to get the Liberal Democrats out of their stated position of favouring a referendum on the principle of a single currency. I said that I was not at all minded to do that, because I thought that it was the right policy and so did my colleagues. He said "But you do realise, Charles, that if we had a referendum the French would not touch it, the Germans would not want anything to do with it, and it would paralyse my entire Government for six months." That was in the run-up to a period during which he decided to invade Iraq, which, I would suggest, paralysed his Government for a hell of a lot longer than six months. It is remarkable how the arguments can change.
	I think that there will have to be a referendum. I also think that, whatever the issue, the argument will evolve, as many arguments have—they did when we debated Maastricht, and I suspect that they will again over coming weeks as the hours wear on and tempers become frayed—into, essentially, the question "Are you in and engaged with Europe, or are you disengaged and therefore effectively stepping back from Europe?" That is why I think that the position we are advocating in that respect is consistent and honest.

Ian Davidson: I thank the right hon. Gentleman, but surely he was guilty of gross exaggeration when he suggested that the Liberal Democrats were split 50:50. It was more like six:six.
	Will the right hon. Gentleman clarify something for us? If I show him my motion, will he show me his? Can we hold both referendums together? I am quite happy to vote for us to stay in if Europe if he is prepared to vote for us to abandon the treaty.

Charles Kennedy: Even I, in my parliamentary and leadership dotage, can recognise that as not being a very good deal from either a personal or a Liberal Democrat point of view. I think I will pass on it, but I will refer it to the leader of my party.
	It seems to me that there are just three big points of principle that should lead us to vote for the Bill's Second Reading—as my party will—and to want the treaty to come into being and subsequently into operation. As the Prime Minister has said, that will enable us as a country to go beyond Lisbon and get on with the job of Europe, under the revised mechanisms envisaged here.
	First, there is the issue of enlargement. Whether or not the present mechanism would lead to gridlock, as many fear—myself included—I think that everyone will acknowledge that it can be improved, and that the treaty offers a mechanism for such improvement. We hear concerns, expressed today with characteristic wit by the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), about the accrual of power that can take place in certain positions in institutions at European Union level. Talk to people in and around the Commission—talk to the Commissioners themselves—and what do they say about the Cabinet style of Commission government? They say that the larger the Commission becomes—the more Commissioners there are—the greater is the propensity for items on the agenda not to be addressed properly, and to be referred back to the Commission President. There is a steady accrual and centralising of power in his office, simply because of the sheer growth in the size of the Commission. That office cannot be kept in check to the extent that is healthy and necessary, which is why the relevant provision in the treaty is so important.
	The second issue has already been touched on. Whether we call this a treaty or a constitution—I am not into the semantic argument—I have always told my friends of Eurosceptic outlook that they are the people who should be most emphatically in favour of some codification of the responsibilities of the institutions of Europe, the rights of redress of the citizens of Europe when they are dissatisfied with those institutions, and ultimately, if they take the most profoundly Eurosceptical view, the right of a nation state to have an agreed legal mechanism enabling it to withdraw from Europe. What we have before us provides that mechanism, and it therefore seems to me that the sceptics more than anyone else, if they chose to pursue a different argument from the one that they have pursued, could commend much of the treaty revision.
	Thirdly, it depends on how we see our position in the world. Everyone agrees now, since the end of the cold war and all the rest, that we live in a multipolar world. As one who is both a pro-American and a pro-European, I do not think that the British position vis-à-vis the United States or Europe is an either/or, and I hope that it never becomes that. However, whether there is a continuation of the style and substance of the present Bush presidency, which I hope does not happen, or whether the new president is a Democrat—and I am under no illusions there either—the fact remains that we cannot hope as an individual country to influence the direction of global United States foreign policy to the extent that we can as full top-table participants in the European Union. That is the choice that is increasingly opening up for our country, and I hope that this treaty provides a way of developing it in terms of the foreign policy process that it will put in train with a view to the future.
	My final point is on a matter that the Minister for Europe knows about only too well—as might do the Foreign Secretary, who made a commendably pro-Europe speech, unlike some Government members. Let us use language accurately to commend the treaty.

Doug Henderson: I remember an older Conservative party that was colonialist and imperialist and wanted to impose little England principles throughout the whole of the world, so this depends on what historical time perspective we relate to.
	The issues before this House tonight are very straightforward. If a Member is to vote against the treaty, they must be convinced and be able to demonstrate that it is against Britain's interests, and if they have any commitment to the European ideal of keeping peace, stability and economic prosperity in Europe, they must also be able to demonstrate that it is against Europe's interests.

Doug Henderson: I think I have given way enough, as I know that other Members wish to speak.
	Let us take the test of Britain's interests. If a Member believes that Britain should be a modern, progressive European state and, as the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Mr. Kennedy) said, that it should be able to speak convincingly in a European context even sometimes after having spoken to the Americans, it must be credible in its relationships with the other EU partners. We must be credible on economic policy, on the single market, on the environmental issues—which most Members would probably agree can only be resolved internationally—and on foreign and security policy. The red line in that area is important as I believe the British people want to be able to have a distinction on foreign and defence policy, but in terms of most of the current challenges we face in the world we have no option but to work with, not against, our EU colleagues. We have to work with them, and we will not be able to have influence unless we have credibility. The treaty passes the British test of having a modern Britain in Europe.
	Is it the right treaty for Europe? If a Member wishes to vote against it on that basis, they must be able to demonstrate that it would cause more damage in Europe than it would cause benefit. The treaty's proposals are reasonably modest. They help to bind the EU together, and to establish a stronger relationship with the larger EU countries, which is demonstrated in the new regulations on voting powers that will come into place. It is also important that those countries feel a common bond with the new, emerging states. There has been agreement on that. If we look at the responses of the emerging states in the EU at the various Councils where these matters have been discussed, it is clear that they more than anyone else agree—Poland, perhaps, excepted, although it has also come round—that this is an important contribution to moving forward and to helping bind them into what they believe the EU is about. They want to be part of an EU that seeks to live in peace and stability. They want to have a demonstrable say in foreign affairs, and to have a sensible economic system that allows enterprise and growth but also looks after social concerns. When I visit the new countries, those are the issues that they say are important to them. If Members believe that that is the case, they have no case to argue against the treaty on the grounds that it is not in the interests of Europe.
	The treaty is in the interests of Britain and Europe, but there are other questions that must be resolved, such as the referendum. I must admit that I was not initially enthusiastic about having a commitment to a referendum. Now the question is whether there a difference between the constitutional proposition that was initially put forward and the treaty. That relates to what the original constitution and the treaty have to say about security policy and the role of the nation state. Those are important points, which we might address in more detail in Committee. However, the basic issue is that the constitution brought together the previous treaties and established a constitutional basis for the future of Europe so that if anyone wanted to amend it, they knew what they were amending. It was a fundamental constitution that would bind together the EU countries. The treaty is not that; instead, it represents the same kind of development that came about as a result of the Amsterdam and Nice treaties, and it is of far less consequence than the Maastricht treaty, whose impact was much more fundamental.
	Should there be a referendum? I know we will come on to that in our 20 days of consideration. If the treaty is different from the constitution, the commitment that the Government gave does not carry forward to the treaty. Therefore, it is proper that this House should say, "Setting that aside, is it valid for us to allow the British people a referendum on the treaty that is currently before the House?" If it was not valid to have a referendum on the Maastricht treaty all those years ago, what is the case for having one now? In anyone's calculation, this treaty is far less significant than the Maastricht treaty. If we have a referendum on this treaty, the EU will become ungovernable in the future should other countries want to have referendums on every single development and change that the EU must make in order to bring itself up to date with whatever are the issues of the day.
	The House should support the Second Reading, and I see no case for a referendum.

William Cash: When the Second Reading goes through tonight, as we assume it probably will, the European caravan will move on and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) and a number of others will doubtless cheer, but the issue of principle is clear. We should oppose this treaty because it undermines this country and its voters, it was pushed through by deceit in the first place and it was rammed through by the Whips.
	The Government pretend that they are drawing red lines. Tony Blair, whose last defiant week in office was dedicated to his potential future as president of Europe, had the last laugh on the Prime Minister as he substituted European and his own potential supremacy in place of that of his former Government. The red lines have as much chance of holding back the tide of European law as King Canute had when he predicted that it would be possible to hold back the sea.
	I see an avalanche of European laws in the European Scrutiny Committee week after week. It is like a tsunami of the kind clearly predicted by Lord Denning in those legal cases so many years ago.

Elliot Morley: I do not think it fair to say that there is nothing of benefit in this treaty. The House has heard, for example, the child protection benefits in terms of development. Most importantly, it contains big environmental improvements in terms of sustainable development and climate change. How can the Conservative party be taken seriously on the environment when it is prepared to vote against those improvements in the treaty?

William Cash: I certainly believe that we must renegotiate the treaties.
	This treaty is more important than the Maastricht one. We have waited and seen for far too long. We must stop this caravan and send it back. The issue in Committee will be to decide which articles of the treaty must be renegotiated. The Government must be put to the test, and we must use the time available to be direct and effective in this battle.
	Today is not exclusively a debate about a referendum, essential though that is, in the national interest. A referendum is the solution to the issue of principle, because political parties, Parliament and much of the media have for so long failed to give proper time and attention to the issue, in the context of the European Union, of the great democratic principle of who governs us and how.
	I am delighted that the Conservative party and its new leader are firmly behind a referendum. The Labour party was right in 1975—the Foreign Secretary should take the smile off his face—as indeed was Tony Blair on his commitment on the original constitutional Bill, persuaded into it as he was by the present Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Justice. To their shame, they have reneged on both matters. The issue is a matter not only of law, but of policy, economics and sovereignty. It is about the impact on the daily life of every person in this country, in virtually every area of policy. It deals with questions relating to schools, hospitals, public services, local and central Government—through the control over the economy—defence, foreign policy, immigration, business, law and much else besides.
	The Government stand indicted for their broken promises in relation to not only the referendum, but the red lines and the charter. They also stand indicted on their claims for the success of the European Union—the European Union does not work. Indeed, just this morning we heard the Prime Minister praising our historic ties with India, which, generally speaking, are justified, particularly since democracy has taken root in that great country. However, is the European Union to dictate our economic relations with India? Why should we not develop our own special relationship with India, building on the best of the past and on economic co-operation, and promoting our common resource of the English language, as we could elsewhere in the Anglosphere world and the Commonwealth based on free trade and co-operation. Trade with other European nations is important and can contribute to that process, but it cannot do so with the European Union as a single legislative entity with legal personality, and certainly not with the current customs union.
	If the holding of a referendum is so important—it is because of the fundamental change involved—it cannot be abandoned merely because the Labour Whips force the treaty on to the statute book. The Leader of the Opposition is right to say that we cannot allow matters to rest if, as is more than likely, a referendum is not won tonight or in Committee. He is right to concentrate on a referendum now and to vote directly against the Bill. He would also be right to commit to a post-ratification referendum in due course, as I urged in my recent early-day motion, which has the support of more than 40 colleagues from the Back Benches alone. That is because a vote born out of deceit on the issue of who governs must be put right. If this Parliament is to be trusted, the people must have their say and Members of Parliament must have the humility to realise that.
	If the call for a referendum is defeated during the course of the Bill's progress, a referendum in any event will have to be proposed in our manifesto and implemented under a Conservative Government, whether or not other member states have ratified. If France and the Netherlands, not to mention Ireland, Denmark or Harold Wilson in 1975, can with impunity reopen negotiations and reverse decisions already taken, as we have so many other times with other treaties over the centuries, so too can the United Kingdom under a new Conservative Government. We must argue for this in the country with passion and conviction.
	This treaty is a European manoeuvre. It was concocted by the Eurocrats, by Germany and by France, and by the betrayal of this country by this Government. Some 70 per cent. of those who have recently been asked said that they wanted these merged treaties renegotiated into an association of member states. As Churchill said in Zurich in September 1946:
	"We are with Europe but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed."
	That is the line we should take.
	I put it to the House that in Committee we must demonstrate how much we must leave out of the treaty, which merges the existing treaties, so that we can form a reasoned basis for proposing a proper renegotiation of each sphere of policy and principle contained in the existing treaties, and insist on trade and co-operation in Europe, but not European government. I am not speaking nationalism, but the national interest. Our involvement in global trade must not be determined by European government claiming falsely to speak with one voice.
	Others have spoken—rightly—of foreign policy, the European presidency, the legal personality and over-regulation, as well as of the red lines and other vital matters, but I conclude with a plea for the supremacy of Parliament, upon which all other matters turn. In amendments to another Bill, whipped in both Houses recently, the Conservative party has already adopted my proposal to override the European Communities Act 1972 and therefore, above all, to require the United Kingdom judiciary to obey that latest law. The supremacy of Parliament, which, I point out to the Foreign Secretary, includes authorising a referendum—something that itself enhances parliamentary authority—must be affirmed in the text of the Bill, because the treaty seeks to infuse the European Union into our constitutional and legal framework, so as to leave little or nothing on which the voters can maintain freedom of choice in our democracy for which so many have fought and died. We must amend the Bill and erect a legislative redoubt that will ensure that the Bill and the treaty, if it were to pass into law, would guarantee the Bill of Rights and parliamentary supremacy, notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972.

Austin Mitchell: I will not even try to follow the speech of the hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash)—I could not—but if this debate is a foretaste of the 20 days to come, it is a very gloomy foretaste indeed. We have heard a couple of excellent speeches, from the Opposition Benches unfortunately. The right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) gave a brilliant speech and although our former Prime Minister is angling to become president of the European Union, the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks still has prospects as president of the Oxford union—he could keep the flag flying there.
	The former Chancellor, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke), made a fascinating speech. Euro-enthusiasts on the Labour Benches were saying, "I wish I could have given that speech". It was honest and entertaining; I did not agree with much of it, but it was certainly effective.
	However, most of the debate has not risen above arguing that if we pass the treaty it will advance motherhood, apple pie, animal welfare, the environment, child care, the NSPCC, bishops and the war on dandruff, and ensure the regular return of library books. Enthusiasts for the treaty say that anybody who is against it—as I am—automatically wants the destruction of Europe. I think the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Mr. Kennedy) said that, but it just ain't true. We should not trade caricatures in that way.
	My position is clear. I do not want the treaty because it would advance a European superstate, which I do not like. I want a referendum on the treaty as a matter of principle, because we are being asked to abdicate from the power given to us as MPs by the people—power to take decisions on their behalf. If the people want to do a thing, we take the decision. If we can no longer do so because the power has been transferred to Europe, that is no longer democracy; we are incapable and the institution of Parliament is weakened. That is the reason both for holding a referendum and for opposing the treaty.
	We have run into the nether reaches of the debate, which is when I always speak, so it is good that the Foreign Secretary is still in the Chamber listening to the arguments. The treaty takes us further towards a superstate. The Foreign Secretary told us that the treaty was not a constitution and that the seven years of travail, which I thought were about a constitution, were in fact about institutional reform. I do not believe that. Ninety per cent. of the treaty is the constitution that emerged from the long travails in which my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) played such an important part. The treaty has not been changed by the red lines, because they were there before.
	If European leaders such as Angela Merkel and Bertie Ahern tell us that the treaty is the same as the constitution, if Giscard d'Estaing tells us that it is the same as the constitution but cleverly disguised, if it looks like a constitution, smells like a constitution and reads like a constitution, as far as I am concerned it is a constitution. We do ourselves no good by saying that it is not a constitution but a completely different document—it is not.
	It is said that diplomats are honest men sent abroad to lie for their country. Well, I do not want Foreign Secretaries to be honest men kept at home to tell untruths about the European Union. That is effectively what has been happening. I do not say "lies"; I say "untruths". Perhaps I should call them Euro-truths, because that is about the same level of accuracy.
	I looked pedantically at the "Shorter Oxford English Dictionary". It is a very big volume; I nearly ruptured myself getting it done from the shelves. It says:
	"Constitution...3. a decree, ordinance, law or regulation...6. the mode in which a state is constituted or organised...7. the system or body of fundamental principles according to which a nation, state or body politic is constituted and governed."
	Whether we call it a treaty or a reheated Euro-dog's dinner, the document has all those characteristics. It is therefore effectively a constitution.
	It is no good telling us that black is white. We are already viewed with suspicion by the great mass of this country's electorate, who think that politicians lie, who automatically distrust anything that comes from a Department and disbelieve it and who tell us that they do not believe a word that we say. So it is no use telling us that black is white, when it manifestly is not. That does not encourage any respect for Europe, for the constitution or for the institutions of Government.
	So let me apply the Paxman test—nothing to do with underpants. To paraphrase the Paxman test—I would apply it to many in the European Union—why is that untruthful person of uncertain parentage telling me what I believe is not true? I can answer that test: Europe is saying that this is not a constitution but a treaty, because in its view, a treaty does not need a referendum. Our Government are telling us that the treaty does not need a referendum, because they know that they would lose. It is as simple as that, and we must be honest about it.
	I found the Liberal Democrat position absolutely extraordinary. The Liberal Democrats want a referendum on something entirely different from the constitution, but that just shows that their love for Europe is greater than their love for democracy. I have always thought that that was their view anyway, so it no great revelation.

David Heathcoat-Amory: The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) correctly identified one of the issues at the heart of the debate: whether the House is entitled to give away powers irrevocably, when those powers ultimately belong to the people whom we represent.
	The other big problem is that the European Union is in something of a crisis. That was identified seven years ago, when the reform process was launched. Heads of Government, meeting at Laeken in 2001, recognised the very deep public disillusionment with the European Union and did not request but instructed the European Union to become more democratic, simpler and closer to its citizens. But as I know, because I was at the Convention on the Future of Europe, those instructions were ignored. Instead, the process fell victim to the iron determination of the European Union institutions not to give up their powers but to centralise them further at the expense of member states. I witnessed that; I predicted that it would fail, and it did, at the hands of the French and Dutch electorate. But instead of lessons being learned, the crimes were repeated.
	Two reports—one from the European Scrutiny Committee and the other from the Foreign Affairs Committee—describe well how the German presidency was not told to draft a treaty last year; it was actually told to produce a report for further discussion. However, it exceeded those instructions, which were given at the previous European summit, and drew up a draft treaty, the text of which was shown to member states only on 19 June, two days before the start of the European summit that approved the treaty. Since then, no change or amendment of any sort has been possible. We had only that two-day window in which to try to influence the result and measure the text against the instructions, which were to ensure simplicity and democracy.
	The Foreign and Commonwealth Office—that once-great Department—meekly assented to that compressed timetable, although it was completely unnecessary to do so, as we had a veto over the whole process. The scandal is that simultaneously, there were repeated assurances that the public would be brought alongside, consulted and engaged. The presidency conclusions of last June say:
	"The European Council emphasises the crucial importance of reinforcing communication with the European citizens, providing full and comprehensive information on the European Union and involving them in a permanent dialogue."
	How can we have permanent dialogue with the European Union when it produces a draft treaty only 48 hours before it is agreed? It is a totally two-faced procedure, and it is a scandal that the House and the Government went along with it. Of course, the reason is obvious: the Government never had the slightest intention of consulting the people. That was done in France and Holland, which said no, and the Government are not going to make that mistake.
	This is the last treaty on which any public vote will be possible, because it now becomes self-amending. Never again will it be brought before the intergovernmental conference, and never again will it be put to a referendum. That is why the treaty is incomprehensible. The position is not, "The treaty's complicated, so we can't ask the people"; the treaty is complicated because the European Union knew that it had been relieved of the obligation to simplify it for our voters and our electorate. That is why it resorted to the old process of drawing up legal texts by politicians and lawyers for other politicians and lawyers.
	If one reads the text of the treaty, as I had to, one can see that we are talking about an entirely unreformed European Union. It remains one of the most old-fashioned organisations in the world—centralised, harmonised, and obsessed with standardisation and over-regulation. It is completely out-manoeuvred by the rest of the world. For example, no other group of countries on earth has followed the European Union in becoming a customs union. Instead, they have all gone down the route of free trade agreements, which achieve the same circulation of goods and people, without binding member states to a trade policy about which they can do nothing, and which prevents them from helping the poorest countries on earth through bilateral agreements.
	The EU is entirely an old-fashioned structure, unreformed in every respect. Another example of that is its budgetary policy. The European Union budget is a byword for waste and inefficiency. In the Convention on the Future of Europe, amendments were tabled to try to reform the budget. I tabled some, but I got no help whatever from the Government representative, the then Europe Minister, the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), who clearly had trouble with money even in those days. Since then, and for the 13th year, the European Union accounts have been rejected by the auditors. Only last week we saw the pitiful spectacle of the Chief Secretary to the Treasury raising our contribution to £5 billion a year, net. We have no idea how that money is spent.
	More policies and powers are being loaded on to the creaking edifice. Criminal justice is just one example, and it goes to the core of what Parliament does in defining penalties and punishments on behalf of the people whom we represent. The treaty marches right into that territory: the red lines that are supposed to protect it are entirely insecure, as is shown by the Select Committee report. The key point is that the treaty is irreversible: if a future Government want to try to retrieve those powers, or if they want a different policy on criminal justice, immigration, asylum and policing, that will be impossible, as we will have exported those powers irreversibly.
	A change of Government will therefore mean nothing. Democracy will die, because people will not vote. Why should they vote at a general election for a party that promises to change our immigration or criminal justice policies, when it is impossible for it to do so? There is only solution—to ask the people. Ultimately, is not our powers that we are discussing but the powers of the people we represent. We cannot give away those powers without their consent. We promised to consult them in national referendums, and the very least that Parliament can do is keep its promises.

Graham Stringer: The right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) defined the debate perfectly, when he said it was about not only whether we support the Lisbon treaty but whether we should have a referendum on that question. Those are the two issues before us, and the referendum is of much more importance than the Lisbon treaty, because more than 600 right hon. and hon. Members stood in the last election on manifestos promising to hold a referendum. I fully recognise that a small number of Members, such as the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke), have made their views robustly clear to the electorate. I absolve the right hon. and learned Gentleman of any commitment to vote for a referendum, because he was honest with the people who elected him. If we do not hold a referendum, however, there are more than 600 right hon. and hon. Members to whom the same does not apply.
	We must remember that debate on what was then called the constitutional treaty was expunged from the 2005 general election campaign, because every party said that it would hold the debate when there was a referendum. I cannot remember a single major discussion on the television about the subject. That is the most important issue, because it is about honesty and integrity, and about democracy in the House.
	In the time I am allowed, I shall quickly go through the issues. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said that this was a change treaty, but he is more or less on his own in saying so. If one met most of the Presidents and Prime Ministers of European states, the people who drafted the constitution, or Select Committee members, one would find that they all said that there was no real difference between the Lisbon treaty and the original proposals in the constitution. I would even ask the Whips, because they tried to persuade me to vote in support of Second Reading on the basis that such a measure appeared in our manifesto. The only treaty in the manifesto was the constitutional treaty, which, wearing another hat, they say has changed. The Government are confused on the issue, as are the Opposition.
	Some of the analogies used to justify the measure are bizarre. The hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey) knows as little about genetics as he does about politics. Just because there is only a 1 per cent. difference between our DNA and that of a chimpanzee or a bonobo, that does not mean that there is a 3 or 4 per cent. change between the constitutional treaty and the Lisbon treaty and thus a difference between the two measures. The difference is that bonobos do not write treaties or compose music. The fact is that what is left in the Lisbon treaty does almost exactly what the original constitutional treaty would have done.

Graham Stringer: I agree that there is dissatisfaction about Europe, and I agree with the former leader of the hon. Lady's party that some time or other there will have to be a real debate with the public, when such issues are voted on. I would be happy to vote on both the treaty and the in-or-out issue, at any time.
	The second reason given is that the House does not do referendums. That was the position 30 or 40 years ago. I have not added up how many referendums there have been in this country in the past 10 years, but we are well into double figures; they are now a well recognised part of the constitution.
	The third reason given for going along with the treaty is that it does not change very much, and without it the European Union would not work very well, so we need it because it will help make the EU more effective. As a member of the Transport Committee, I have looked seriously at how the EU has bulldozed through the Galileo project. It seems to me that the EU works very effectively at the moment, and that if it is looking for priorities, it should put the common agricultural policy right before dealing with the details of the Lisbon treaty.
	I have listed the arguments that have been put publicly. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) is right to say that the private discussions are along these lines: "We can't have a referendum; it would damage the Government, because they, and the Labour party, would lose it." I say to members of my own party who hold that point of view that the electorate might well reject the Lisbon treaty—but if that is true, what are we doing putting it through anyway? It is much more damaging to the integrity of politics if we promise people something at election time and do not carry it through later.
	Many of my right hon. and hon. Friends agonise about why turnout is going down at local and general elections. All sorts of gimmicks are considered; they look to electronic voting and changing voting days from Thursday to Sunday, for example. The most important factor, however, is whether when we get elected we carry out the commitments we made when talking to the electorate at election time. The commitment to a referendum was given by more or less all the parties in the House, and the electorate can reasonably expect it to be carried through.
	Another reason given is even more shameful: "People don't care. How many letters have you had on this issue?" I have not had many, but when I talk to people, when they stop me in supermarkets, they show that they do care about the issue. It is not at the front of their minds, as it is of ours, all the time, but they know that a commitment will not be carried through.
	Another reason is whispered in the Tea Room and elsewhere. It is that people do not understand; the issue is too complicated for electors to grasp, and they are not up to it. Apparently, they are up to electing hon. Members, but not to understanding the Lisbon treaty. I ask all right hon. and hon. Members who really believe that to use their communications allowance to write to their electors to tell them that they are not up to understanding the Lisbon treaty. I believe that my electors understand what the treaty is about, and would welcome a vote both on the Lisbon treaty and on whether to stay in or leave the European Union.
	Yet another reason given—sometimes publicly, sometimes privately—is that the real issue is about whether to stay in or out. That has some credence. There is an appetite for debate among the electorate as to whether we should be in or out of the EU; I would want to stay in, as it happens.
	One would not get through a first-year undergraduate course in philosophy by being asked one question and then moving on to a completely different question. We promised people a vote on what was the then the constitutional treaty and is now the Lisbon treaty. It is healthy in a democracy for the electorate to be sceptical about their politicians and to question and wonder about what they are doing. When that scepticism turns to cynicism because they no longer believe their politicians, there is a real danger of damage to the democracy that we all support.

David Curry: I shall vote for the Bill and the treaty tonight. It is always a difficult matter to find oneself in a very small minority on an issue that engages one's party with a great deal of passion. I suppose that if I look back on what has really animated my political life, it has been the desire to see the United Kingdom engage thoroughly with Europe. It has been a fairly stony path, and I have to say that I see no positive conclusion yet. I shall vote for the treaty very much despite the Government, not because of them—particularly given that, of the two very amusing Front-Bench speeches, at least the one by my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) was intentionally so.
	Too often, the treaty is treated as a religion. The European Union is not a religious issue but a political one. It is not the Book of Revelations, nor is it the Book of Job. Different Members treat it as if it is either a wonderful document with biblical certainty, or nothing but a long chapter of lamentations—but it is neither of those.
	I am not very interested in the extent to which the treaty resembles the old constitution. Of course, countries that voted for the old constitution will think that it is the same thing, while those that were against it have every interest in showing that it is something different. What matters, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) said, is how bankable the various red line opt-ins and opt-outs are, because what is different, if they hold, is Britain's range of obligations under the treaty. It is the same treaty, in stark terms, but Britain's obligations are not the same as they were under the original constitution.
	We should judge the treaty on the very practical ground of which we have been proud in British politics: does it work? It may not be impeccable, but will it make things better, and does it contain hidden bear traps? The whole argument in this debate has really been about not whether it is intrinsically good or bad but whether there is something hidden in it that will push us inexorably towards a different sort of Europe. Since this is the 400th anniversary of Milton's birth, perhaps I can quote a line from "Paradise Lost"—
	"Present fears
	Are less than horrible imaginings",
	which is probably the motto of the Eurosceptics.
	The treaty flows from enlargement, which was a huge political victory. It is worth remembering that the enlargement of the European Union was the biggest and most dramatic peaceful shift of population and power in Europe since the decline of the western Roman empire 1,600 years ago. The changes give us a better chance of dealing with the new agendas that are pressing upon us, which have constantly been repeated in the debate—climate change, population movement, competitiveness and terrorism. They do not guarantee it—that is a question of political will—but institutionally, they make us better able to respond positively if member states can summon up the will.
	Most aspects are commonsensical. The so-called permanent president of the Council is perfectly sensible; rotation is a pretty daft idea. The foreign policy high representative will certainly improve co-operation. The fact that President Putin has just signed a gas deal with Bulgaria illustrates the extent to which the European Union needs to get its act together faced with the Russian state. As for qualified majority voting, it is worth remembering that it delivered one of the greatest British triumphs in the European Union—the single market. Mrs. Thatcher would never have delivered the single market without qualified majority voting; it was the instrument that delivered that huge British success story. I simply do not believe that some covert agenda will overwhelm either Britain's ability to state her interests or, for that matter, her identity.
	I would probably christen the opt-outs or red lines the "Wellington clauses", because they always remind me of the Duke of Wellington's thin red lines at Torres Vedras during the Peninsula war, where, very conveniently, the enemy was the French—an attitude that has rather endured, I have to say. When the impact of things such as population movement, which flows from climate change, hits the United Kingdom, I wonder whether we will eventually see the case for greater policy co-ordination and integration. The treaty is a pretty modest one. It does not compare with the Single European Act or Maastricht, but the consequences of failure would be huge. We are four years on from the French referendum veto and the Dutch veto. It is a huge matter for the United Kingdom, and huge for Europe.
	I am not persuaded by the case for a referendum. We are rightly concerned with the decline of Parliament and its subservience to the Executive. That is the subject of almost eternal debate. Frankly, I can think of no greater way of accelerating Parliament's decline than to move to voting by plebiscite, for three reasons. First, the liberal and tolerant society in which I believe would be put at risk if we moved to government by plebiscite. Secondly, plebiscite is almost invariably an instrument against change. Thirdly, it is a lethal weapon in the hands of the Executive. As a parliamentarian, I do not believe in any of those three things. There may be once-in-a-lifetime changes—the single currency would be one—that are appropriate matters for a referendum, but not this relatively modest treaty.
	We do need a pretty long respite from institutional change, but equally, there is a huge opportunity for Britain if it can overcome its habitual and, if I may say so, consensual response of baffled equivocation to any initiative that comes from Europe. That is why I said earlier that my political life had been in many ways animated by the desire to see Britain engage with Europe. Political and personal reasons lie behind that concern and preoccupation. I said that I had travelled on fairly stony ground; I hope that I may yet see, once this treaty is out of the way, the United Kingdom deciding that we should actually—in the old-fashioned Yorkshire expression—"get stuck in" to our relationship with Europe, because there are huge benefits to be gained from a Europe that is in many ways more sympathetic to the UK's world view than it has been for many years.
	I shall vote for this treaty. I shall not, when the opportunity comes, vote for a referendum. It will be with great sadness, because of the position of my party, but with the understanding that tolerance of views that are privately, personally and passionately held has always been understood in this House, and it is in that spirit I shall vote in the way that I feel I must.

Ian Davidson: Gosh, that is an interesting point, which will now be noted in  Hansard.
	On balance, I find myself against the treaty. One of the most significant speeches, for me, was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty). His speech showed why he supported the treaty, but he said that he saw it as a tipping point. To a great extent, I see it as a tipping point, too. I object to the centralisation that it will bring into effect.
	I regret that the Liberals in particular have chosen to hang themselves on the hook of saying, "Here is a question. We want to answer a completely different one." It is noticeable that virtually none of them are in the Chamber at the moment. They seem to take the view that they can simply avoid the question and hope it goes away, and that if they ask other questions, such as, "Are you for or against cracked pavements?", people will overlook the fact that they appear to have no observations on the matter. It is fair to say that only 20 per cent. of Liberals have a clear view on cracked pavements; the others regard the subject as too political and would rather discuss whether buses should run on time. Even on that, as I understand it, the party is split.
	There are questions about whether we should have a referendum that have not been answered. I am not necessarily obsessed by the question of referendums in all circumstances, but we promised to hold one. It was in our manifesto. It is unequivocally clear that we promised a referendum on these questions. The sole reason that we are not having a referendum in Britain is that the European political elite have learned from the lessons of France and Holland. They have learned that if they do not want people to give them the wrong answer, they should not ask them the question. Let us not forget that the Portuguese wanted a referendum, confident that there would be a yes vote. However, they were leaned on by Britain, France and some other European leaders not to have a referendum because it would cause embarrassment to this country in particular and would enhance the pressure for a referendum. For Britain to have pressed another country not to have a referendum because it might be embarrassing somewhat undermines the case that a referendum is not necessary.
	I remember when those in my party had that long conversation with themselves and refused to listen to the public, and when many of those who are now ardent Blairites were ardent Bennites. I disagreed with the same people then as I do now. We had that conversation while ignoring the electorate. We are ignoring the electorate on this matter, to our grave danger. The circumstances are significant.
	Let me return to the Liberals; I always enjoy doing so in these circumstances. Does anybody remember Nick Clegg? He used to be the Liberal spokesman on foreign affairs and moved a motion at the Liberal Democrat party conference in 2005 that said:
	"Any proposals which involve significant change in the relationship between the Union, the member states and its citizens should be approved in Britain through a referendum."
	 [ Interruption. ] Yes, he did say that, and the motion was carried. I sometimes wonder what happened to that Nick Clegg, because he also—

Ian Davidson: I am sorry, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but I was not sure whether he was the same person. I should refer to him as the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr. Clegg). In an article in  The Guardian, the hon. Gentleman referred to the Government being afraid to hold a referendum. He wrote:
	"The real reason, of course, why the government does not want to hold a referendum is the fear that it may lose... It is the same fear that led Peter Hain to camouflage the constitution with comic inaccuracy as nothing more than a 'tidying up exercise'... Nothing will do more damage to the pro-European movement than giving room to the suspicion that we have something to hide, that we do not have the 'cojones' to carry out our argument to the people".
	I understand that "cojones" is Spanish for a rude word. That demonstrates to me that the Liberal Democrats can talk balls in many languages—and, indeed, frequently do so.

Roger Godsiff: The right hon. Gentleman makes a good, valid point.
	It has been suggested that, unless we adopt the amending treaty, the EU will be prevented from fighting climate change. However, it already has plenty of powers in areas such as environmental policy. The EU does not need a constitutional treaty to fight climate change. It simply needs to develop policies that work, and to have the political will to pursue them.
	It is easy to label anyone who does not support the amending treaty as anti-European, and to say that referendums are somehow un-British. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) has pointed out, however, Labour Governments have quite rightly held referendums in the past, including those on Welsh and Scottish devolution and, back in 1975, we had a referendum on whether the UK should remain a member of the Common Market. Furthermore, even staunch supporters in the media, such as  The Observer newspaper, believe that there is justification for the people of this country being given a vote on this issue. In an editorial on 2 September last year, it said:
	"The treaty is indeed a purely technical document. But it salvages the political heart of the constitution—streamlined voting, a strengthened European presidency and diplomatic service. So the symbols have been dropped, but the political charge continues apace. What legitimacy can it have without a public vote?"
	Some supporters of the amending treaty try to make out that the changes in it are insignificant. On 25 June last year, in his last House of Commons comment on Europe, our former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, gave us one of his great one-line quotes. When referring to bringing together the staff of the Commission and the European Council, he said:
	"Are we to have a referendum on an open-plan office?"—[ Official Report, 25 June 2007; Vol. 462, c. 26.]
	That is a great quote, but if all this is about is an open-plan office, one wonders why his friend, Mr. Sarkozy, is promoting our former Prime Minister to be its manager, and why our former Prime Minister is alleged to be seriously considering such a prospect.
	The argument about the future of Europe is not, in my opinion, about whether the United Kingdom stays in or leaves; it is about the sort of European Union we want. Do we want a federation—a united states of Europe? I do not believe that that would be in the long-term interests of the people of this country or of Europe. Or do we want a confederation of independent states working for common objectives?

Roger Godsiff: The hon. Gentleman makes his points powerfully and I shall make a further comment about that in a few moments.
	What I want to see is a confederation, but I believe that the amending treaty as it stands is a further step towards a federation—a united states of Europe. However, let me make this point clear—if that is what the British people want, so be it. What I believe is very wrong is to deny the British people an opportunity to have their say. They were promised a referendum by all the major political parties at the last election and I regret to say that, without a commitment to that from those on the Front Bench tonight, I will not be able to support the Bill.

Ian Taylor: I have only a few minutes, so I will be brief. As I have never supported the concept of referendums, I am in no confusion about that issue. The matter before us tonight is not really about whether there should be a referendum, but whether the treaty is beneficial to the United Kingdom.
	I was saddened by the Foreign Secretary's opening speech. It is not that he said anything with which I particularly disagreed; what saddened me was the tone he adopted, which echoed the tone of the Government's approach, who have sought to reassure people that somehow this awfully threatening issue can be defended by a series of red lines or other qualifications that the Government have proposed. The public out there are unsurprisingly confused when it comes to understanding why the treaty is a good thing. I shall vote for the treaty tonight, because I believe that it is a good thing, but I hope that the Minister for Europe will explain to others the treaty's benefits to our country and why it will help us to influence what is about to happen in Europe and to meet some of the challenges ahead better than would be the case without it.
	That brings me to the brilliant speech by my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), whose eloquence almost tempted me to agree with him. But then I suddenly thought that a brilliant speech before the House does not enable us as a party to influence the very leaders of other countries whom we will need to have on our side if we want to make the changes we desire to the character of the European Union. That is the fundamental weakness of my own party's position—it wants to be in Europe, but it really does not like it and it tells others that it does not like it. We are then rather surprised that others do not want to do what we want to do in the European Union.
	This treaty provides several key developments. It is a shame that the EU is not more united on foreign policy, so if the treaty persists in allowing that to happen, it is all to the good. Given the problems we face in dealing with Russia at the moment, we need more rather than less unity. It is also important to address energy issues, so if the treaty enables us to do so, that, too, is a good thing. Speaking as a former Minister who did business at several Council meetings, qualified majority voting is, by and large, a good thing because it overcomes the opposition of any one member country.
	Will the Minister for Europe please address some of those advantages so that the British people understand that if one wants to stay in the EU, one must make it work much more effectively? It is of no benefit to the EU that there is a weak Commission, and a weak Commission is likely to persist if, as further enlargement takes place, measures to introduce a leaner version—for example, the treaty would reduce the number of commissioners to 18—are not introduced. It is vital that we have someone in the EU who can represent the decisions that the nation states have made, so it is good to appoint a President for that purpose. It is very important to have greater consistency in foreign policy, particularly in the middle east, so if the EU nations have agreed on a policy, we need someone to represent those nations.
	In my view, the British public have not even begun to understand that this treaty brings benefits to the UK and enables the UK better to express itself. What we must do now is ensure that the leaders of other countries realise that our vision of Europe as one that is more liberal, more open and more interested in global trade and global environmental questions, is worth taking a lead on. In order to take a lead, however, we must convince those countries that we believe in the institutions created in the European Union. I will support the Government tonight, but I hope that they will subsequently be more enthusiastic about the tasks ahead.

Mark Francois: I refer the hon. Gentleman to his own report, which discusses elements of the document and says that one foreign policy aspect
	"is unlikely to be beneficial to the UK's position in the EU."
	It then says
	"We recommend that the Government should publicly acknowledge the significance of the foreign policy aspects of the Lisbon Treaty."
	Those are not my words; they are the words of the hon. Gentleman's report.
	The Foreign Secretary has a problem. A whole range of other European Union leaders have an inconvenient tendency to tell their own electorates just how similar the two documents are. Bertie Ahern, the Irish Prime Minister, said that they were 90 per cent. the same. The Spanish Foreign Minister said that they were 98 per cent. the same. The Spanish Prime Minister literally went one better, and said that they were 99 per cent. the same. Valery Giscard d'Estaing—back in November, before someone whispered in his ear—told the "Today" programme that when the two were compared,
	"it's just another presentation and combination of presentations but the text is word to word the same one."
	Even within the Labour pantheon back home, the cracks are beginning to open wider. Bob Crowe— [Laughter.]

Mike Gapes: Bob Crowe!

Daniel Kawczynski: My hon. Friend mentioned Bob Crowe. He will be aware that the TUC has passed resolutions in favour of a referendum on this issue. Labour Members are betraying the TUC through their stance tonight.

Mark Francois: My hon. Friend has pre-empted me. I will come to the trade unions in a moment.
	The Government have comprehensively lost the argument that the two documents are different. Hardly anyone in the media and less than 10 per cent. of the public believe them on that point. It is, to coin a phrase, patently obvious that the emperor has no clothes, but still the Government have to maintain this desperate pretence; and, crucially, they are asking every member of the House to suspend all independent judgment and become complicit in the deception tonight.
	Under pressure, the Government fall back upon their supposed red lines— which in any case are almost exactly the same as they were in 2005, when we were promised a referendum. However, the European Scrutiny Committee, in two detailed reports, examined the Government's red lines and found them wanting. The Committee's Labour Chairman, the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty), told the BBC's "Today" programme that they would "leak like a sieve"—and that at the end of an examination that took some two months.
	Not only do the red lines fail to protect our sovereignty; as clause 6 shows, the treaty carries forward from the original constitution the new so-called "simplified revision procedure". That is the "ratchet clause", which means that in future individual vetoes could be surrendered for ever after a brief debate on a simple House of Commons motion. If the Bill is passed tonight, we will table amendments in Committee to strengthen the protection, so that no veto can be given up under the auspices of the Bill itself without primary legislation being required.
	The Government's reaction to all this amounts to crude scare tactics. In the weekend press, the Foreign Secretary described opposition to the treaty as an "extreme position", but the people of France and the Netherlands voted against the constitution in
	2005, and no one called them "extreme" as a result. As the polls consistently show that three quarters of the British people want a referendum on this treaty, is the Foreign Secretary calling three quarters of our electorate extreme? If he is, his colleagues in marginal constituencies might not thank him for that judgment.
	The trade unions, which voted overwhelmingly for a referendum on the Lisbon treaty at the TUC conference last autumn, might well not thank him either. Let me read out the words of Paul Kenny, the general secretary of the GMB, who proposed the motion. He said:
	"The GMB is not an anti-European union. The GMB is not an anti-Labour union...If there is disenchantment with Europe, blame the lack of political vision of MPs but don't blame the trade unions for reminding politicians of their promises to the British people".
	That motion was carried overwhelmingly.
	Labour's manifesto for the 2005 general election was clear about the constitution. It said:
	"We will put it to the British people in a referendum and campaign wholeheartedly for a yes vote".
	The Prime Minister said just before taking office that he regarded honouring that manifesto as "a matter of trust" with the British people. Given that, how can any Labour MP who votes to give this Bill a Second Reading tonight go back to their own electorate—or, indeed, their own constituency Labour party—and look people squarely in the eye when they will have betrayed the manifesto on which they were originally elected to this House?
	The Government's wriggling on this issue has been matched only by that of the Liberal Democrats, whose Members are present in force tonight—all three of them. Their 2005 manifesto commitment was equally clear. It stated:
	"We are clear in our support for the EU constitution, which we believe is in Britain's interest—but ratification must be subject to a referendum of the British people".
	Liberal Democrat support for such a referendum goes back even further than that, however. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks pointed out, when the new leader of the Liberal Democrats—whom I congratulate on his forthcoming promotion to the Privy Council—was still an MEP he wrote an article for  The Guardian in which he argued forcefully for a referendum on the EU constitution. He said—and I hope I get the pronunciation right—that:
	"Nothing will do more damage to the pro-European movement than giving room to the suspicion that we have something to hide, that we do not have the 'cojones' to carry our argument to the people."
	I am afraid that the Liberal Democrat spokesman this evening was rather confused. At one point, he argued that what we needed was an in-out referendum on Europe, and then, a few minutes later, he said we could not have a referendum on the EU constitution—on the Lisbon treaty—because he claimed that that would represent, effectively, an in-out referendum on Europe. That was the argument he put to the House. I say to him and his colleagues, when the Division bell rings in a few minutes' time, let us see exactly what cojones the Liberal Democrats have and which Lobby they go through.
	That brings me on to one further argument against giving the Bill a Second Reading. Leaving aside all the technicalities of the treaty—the ratchet clause, the red lines, the collapse of the third pillar—every Member knows from their postbag that, despite the work we all put in every week, support for politics and politicians is diminishing. Will voting for this Bill improve that situation or make it worse? Will it bolster or weaken our authority as an institution in the eyes of an increasingly sceptical public if we surrender even more of our remaining powers without public consent and on the basis of a con that is plain for all to see? Even if the Government were somehow to force the Bill through the Commons on a three-line Whip, I believe the best they can hope for is a pyrrhic victory. They might regard that as a short-term advance, but it could turn out to be something of a strategic defeat in respect of the long-term attitude of the British people towards the European Union; and because of the way it had been done, it could only serve to undermine the credibility of the House in the eyes of the people who sent us here.
	Every Member is ultimately accountable to their electors for how they cast their vote. We shall ensure that voters in every Labour and Liberal Democrat constituency are made well aware of how their Member votes on this treaty. Members on both sides of the House should consider that the Government have completely failed to convince the media and the British people that this treaty is anything other than the constitution under another name—they have also failed to convince the majority of Labour Back Benchers deep down in their heart of hearts.
	We are the guardians of the people's liberties —[Laughter.] Labour Members may laugh, but we are. The powers vested in this House belong ultimately to the people. In a sense, they are not ours to give away—certainly not without a democratic mandate and definitely not on the basis of a false premise. Let us reject this Bill and defend the interests of the British people, unless and until they are allowed to decide the matter.

Jim Murphy: Today's proceedings have been the start of a long debate. I am looking forward to spending more time with the hon. Member for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois) than with my wife, although that enthusiasm was dimmed when he quoted Bob Crow at me. The day when this Government take policy advice from Bob Crow is the day when we are unquestionably destined for opposition. The evening when the hon. Gentleman cites Bob Crow as a policy adviser is the evening when he confirms that his party is destined to stay in opposition.
	We listened to almost two dozen speakers this afternoon and evening. We heard different views from different sides of the House. We heard contributions from the eminent Chairmen of the European Scrutiny Committee and the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, my hon. Friends the Members for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty) and for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes). Both Chairmen eloquently and in detail explained to the House yet again that both those Committees rejected the proposition that the reform treaty should be put to a referendum of this country—that is clear indeed.
	The analysis underpinning so many of this evening's speeches is that the world is changing, and continues to change, at an incredible pace, and that Europe has changed for ever. Across the world the pace of economic, cultural and political globalisation is unsurpassed in our history. In Europe, we are no longer a front line in the old balance of power politics. We celebrated the collapse of the Berlin wall, whose destruction helped to build a stronger Europe.
	The treaty, which we will discuss for the weeks ahead, reflects the fact that Europe's structures have not kept pace with that global and European transformation. Britain joined a European Community of six members. Europe's rules were subsequently adjusted to take account of a membership of 10, then 12 and then 17 member states, but they are inadequate for a European Union of 27 countries. This treaty makes some sensible improvements.

Jim Murphy: That is not the case at all. The fact is that the Dutch Council of State, for example—an independent body—very clearly, precisely and legalistically came to that conclusion. In Denmark, an independent, objective opinion was reached on whether there should be a referendum. The fact is that all the countries of the European Union have declared that the constitutional approach has been abandoned.
	The treaty that we are considering through the Bill marks the end of a rather circular debate about European structures. It offers improvements on environmental policy. Treaty article 2 sets out a new objective to tackle climate change that is welcomed by the major climate campaign organisations in the UK. The treaty improves the development situation. A new treaty article and a new commitment to the eradication of poverty in the developing world is again welcomed by campaigning organisations across the UK, including Oxfam. The treaty also recognises children's rights for the first time in a European treaty. Part of the ludicrous nature of European debates in the past has been the recognition of animal rights, but no treaty has ever recognised children's rights. The Bill will also empower Parliament in a much more adventurous and ambitious way, by introducing clauses 5 and 6.
	Debates about Europe's future are too often seen through the prism of Britain's past and the sense that the European Union is in some way a vast conspiracy against the UK. Without Europe, the UK would be poorer, less influential in the world and less safe. It would be poorer, because as a trading nation, we rely on a single market of 480 million citizens, with 3 million jobs in the UK reliant on our relationship with the EU. We would be less influential in the world as a medium-sized country. Of course, with a successful economy and exceptional armed forces, we would still have influence, but we would be throwing away the added clout of the opportunity to speak with one voice across the EU. We would also be less safe. The EU's work in fighting international crime and terrorism makes Britain's citizens safer. Safety standards in our workplaces, on our roads and for imported goods are also important innovations and reforms that strengthen the UK.
	It is also clear that today's Conservative party in most parts is captured by an isolationist tendency. The Conservative view, already expressed by the shadow Foreign Secretary in the past, is that Britain is already a foreign land. Every Government in the EU and every main opposition party in Europe support the treaty. The shadow Minister for Europe was given the opportunity again this evening to name just one European Government who oppose the treaty in the way that he does vociferously. Again, I give him the opportunity to name one Government, or even just one major Conservative party, who share their obsession about Europe and opposition to the treaty—just one.  [ Interruption. ] There we have the answer: the hon. Member for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois) is part of a coalition that involves the Dutch Animals party, Sinn Fein of Ireland and a rag-bag of Communist parties from across Europe. Is it not remarkable that the Conservatives cannot find one European Conservative party that supports their policy, when we consider, for example, that Italy has 10 Conservative parties of its own? The truth is that the Conservative party of today is in large part more obsessed and isolated than ever before.
	The hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) made a similar speech to those that he has made for the past two or three decades. His views used to be on the periphery of the Conservative party's European position. Now, he finds himself increasingly in the mainstream—the hon. Gentleman nods about that—with the emergence of an organisation called Better Off Out. An ever-increasing number of Conservative Members are members of Better Off Out.  [ Interruption. ] The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) is a member of Better Off Out. Better Off Out is so hard-line and simplistic on Europe that the hon. Member for Stone would not even join the organisation. I endorse the Bill.

Anne McIntosh: It gives me great pleasure to present a petition on behalf of petitioners of Huby, Sutton-on-the-Forest and Crayke, and the surrounding villages and their residents, in favour of the continuation of the rural post office network across North Yorkshire. While the post office in Huby is not currently set to close, the petitioners wish to combine the village store with the existing post offices in Huby to secure a vibrant future to serve the village, and those of Huby, Sutton-on-the-Forest, Crayke and the surrounding area. Some 350 signatures have been acquired from those two or three villages.
	The petition states:
	The Humble Petition of Joan Holder, Huby Post Office, York and others of like disposition,
	Sheweth
	That they fear the proposed Post Office Network review will result in unacceptable numbers of Post Office closures. They wish to see their access to Post Offices across North Yorkshire remain as wide as is currently the case and that there be no further cuts in postal services. They recognise that their Post Offices provide a vital service in a rural community to the most vulnerable, the elderly, the less mobile and those with young families.
	Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House urges the Government to reverse the Post Office's proposed Network Change Programme.
	And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, &c.
	[P000109]

Graham Stuart: I am sure that it is on behalf of the whole House that I say that we send out our sympathy to families suffering from flooding during the past few days. I know that my constituents in Burstwick and the surrounding area are concerned tonight that the Burstwick drain may overflow and cause flooding there.
	I am grateful for the opportunity to speak about an issue of great importance to my constituents and an increasing number of people throughout the country—the use of 0844 telephone numbers in GP surgeries. This matter first came to my attention last year when I was contacted by several constituents. They were upset and angry that almost a dozen GP surgeries in the East Riding of Yorkshire had switched to automated phone systems using 0844 numbers, which are significantly more expensive to use than local calls. After looking into the issue in closer detail, it quickly became obvious that this was causing alarm in other parts of the country too.
	According to the service provider Network Europe Group, more than 1,200 GP surgeries—about a fifth of the total number of practices in England—are now using these numbers, and it is believed that more than 300 others have had 0844 or 0845 numbers installed by other companies. In November, I tabled a motion in the House calling for an end to this use of 0844 numbers. Almost 60 MPs, from all over the House, have signed it. The Department of Health has also admitted that it has received more than 100 letters of complaint on the subject since January 2007. This issue has united politicians, residents and patients groups alike—people who can spot an unfair practice when they see one, and who do not like it when the chronically ill, the old, the disabled and those on low incomes are taken advantage of. That is what I believe is currently happening, under the present system, under the present Government.
	I would like to talk a little about these numbers in more detail, and then discuss how they came into existence in the first place, before giving my reasons why they should cease to be used in this way. Such numbers are part of a revenue-sharing telephone system. I have corresponded on this subject with various people, including the British Medical Association, which suggests that no one has benefited from it. However, in case anyone is any doubt, I looked on the internet this evening, and I can tell the House that Call Sure business telephone numbers will provide basic 0844 special rate G6 telephone numbers and that they have
	"Other revenue generating opportunities available".
	If someone installs an 0844 number, the company will ensure that the business concerned earns up to 1.45p per minute. I believe that on the scale that GPs operate, that could be up to 2p per minute—albeit that, I am sure, the money is recycled for the benefit of patients.
	The money generated from each individual call is shared between the phone operator and the GP practice in question. Although they are not officially classed as premium-rate numbers, the new numbers are up to 4p per minute more expensive to call from a standard BT line and can cost up to 40p a minute from a mobile phone. As I said, 2p of that can be contributed to the GP's practice.

Graham Stuart: It is a shocking fact that after 10 years of this Labour Government—the principle behind the NHS being that it should be free at the point of delivery—my constituents, as they travel to shift work in Hull from rural Holderness, can find themselves, as they drive along, unsure about whether they will secure an appointment that day, whether they will be at work or whether they will have to ask their boss to allow them to go back and see the doctor, and when the systems open at eight o'clock, they are on their mobile phones—

Graham Stuart: Yes, using a hands-free kit. They may be being driven by a colleague, in a car-share—I am sure that the green inhabitants of my constituency would be doing that. They call up, and when they are put in a queue, it can cost 40p a minute. Who will it affect most? The chronically ill. Among the chronically ill, on whom will it impact hardest? Those with the lowest incomes. I cannot believe or accept that the Government and the Minister—who I know is a hard-working campaigner for all the people in our system, and takes a great interest in social care and other matters—are comfortable with that ongoing scandal.